UK not to use fully autonomous weapons

In the context of an increasing wave of concerns with regard to autonomous weapons, the UK Ministry of Defence has reportedly announced that the country has a policy of not developing and using fully autonomous weapons. According to the policy, cited by The Guardian, the UK opposes the development of autonomous weapons system that could operate without human control: ‘UK policy is that the operation of weapons will always be under control as an absolute guarantee of human oversight, authority and accountability. The UK does not possess fully autonomous weapon systems and has no intention of developing them.’ Minister Mark Lancaster was quoted for saying that, while the UK does not ignore robotics and is keeping its military up to date with technological evolutions, ‘weapons will always be under human control’.