This Report provides a summary of an expert meeting on the legal review of autonomous weapons systems (‘AWS’), which was convened by the Australian Department of Defence in Sydney in April 2024. This Meeting was the second such meeting, building upon the inaugural Expert Meeting, which took place in Sydney in March 2023. The Expert Meeting was attended by governmental and non-governmental experts from eight States (Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States).
This Meeting provided an opportunity to review the progress of international discourse about the regulation of AWS generally, as well as how legal reviews have featured in that debate. Governmental experts also provided updates and further information about their national practices as they pertain to the conduct of legal reviews, and the review of AWS and, autonomous or AI-enabled capabilities more generally. Separate to enhancing State information sharing in undertaking legal reviews of AWS, this Meeting undertook to again reflect upon the specific practices related to the conduct of legal reviews that may require adjustment to account for the challenges presented by AWS, and the introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomy into military capabilities, more generally.
In addition to the confidence building function undertaken in relation to the sharing of State-specific practices, this meeting worked to consolidate an international community of practice of like-minded States (and their representatives), and practitioners from industry and academia, who are building the corpus of knowledge about the methods by which the challenges presented by AWS in conducting a sufficiently robust legal reviews, can be overcome. This community of practice has also contributed to discussion and understanding of Elements of Good Practice in the review of AWS.