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UK sees no need for ban on Laws

The British government is refusing to join the international campaign aimed at banning lethal autonomous weapons system.

The British government is refusing to join the international campaign aimed at banning lethal autonomous weapons system (Laws), commonly known as ‘killer robots’.

“At present, we do not see the need for a prohibition on the use of Laws, as international humanitarian law already provides sufficient regulation for this area,” the Foreign Office told the Guardian.

Representatives from 120 countries, including Britain, have gathered in the Swiss city of Geneva to attend the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Rights groups including Human Rights Watch and the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots have already called for an international ban on lethal autonomous weapons system.

A spokesman for Campaign to Stop Killer Robots which is a coalition of scientists and human rights groups, told Press TV that the development of Laws should be internationally banned.

“Machines cannot value human life. They cannot make legal decisions. They cannot make ethical decisions or have human reasoning. So we think that there needs to be a very clear international law negotiated by the states now that prevents the development of these systems before they end-up on a battle field or domestic policing situation,” Thomas Nash told Press TV on Tuesday.

“We are here at United Nations in Geneva at a meeting for all governments and the world to consider the problem of autonomous weapon for killer robots. As a part of the campaign to stop killer robots we have a fundamental moral concern with the idea that the machines could be programmed to take people’s lives, to fire missile, to drop bombs without a human being pressing a button or pulling a trigger. That is beyond existing system, like armed drones. There is a human being looking at a target. We already have enough problems with the drone strikes in like Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan etc,” he added.

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