TEHRAN – The Iranian Red Crescent Society (IRCS) has proposed the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent (IFRC) for an “addendum to Geneva Conventions” to limit the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in warfare.

The proposal has been put forward by the head of the IRCS, Pirhossein Kolivand, in a meeting with the IFRC undersecretary-general for national society development and operations coordination, Xavier Castellanos Mosquera, on Sunday.

The IFRC official welcomed the proposal, promising to put it on the agenda, and follow up on its implementation through official international channels.

“Today, the world is facing a new version of threats which challenges the enforcement of the existing international humanitarian law,” Kolivand highlighted.

“The proposed addendum focuses on updating and regulating specific rules on utilizing AI in attacks, combined wars, as well as modern technologies in armed conflicts. 

Without any legal and ethical framework, the use of AI in conflicts can lead to unprecedented human catastrophe. Therefore, it is essential that international organizations, particularly the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent,be in front line of developing deterrent, transparent and binding regulations,” Kolivand further noted.

A typical example of catastrophic AI scenario occurred during the US-Israeli imposed war against Iran. 

On the first day of the illegal war against the country, February 28, American forces struck the Shajareh Tayyebeh primary school in Minab, in southern Hormozgan province, hitting the building at least two times during the morning session. American forces killed between 175 and 180 people, most of them girls between the ages of seven and 12.

The building in Minab had been classified as a military facility in a Defense Intelligence Agency database that had not been updated to reflect that the building had been separated from the adjacent Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps compound and converted into a school, a change that satellite imagery shows had occurred by 2016 at the latest. 

A chatbot did not kill those children. People failed to update a database, and other people built a system fast enough to make that failure lethal.

By the time the war began, “AI safety” and “alignment” and “hallucination” had become the terms of every argument about artificial intelligence. When the school was bombed, those were the terms people reached for, despite the fact that this critical apparatus offered a poor fit for the older, more mature stack of technologies involved in targeting.

************ IRCS is IFRC’s reliable global partner 

“The Iranian Red Crescent Society is our reliable global partner; the international societies should know that during the 40-day [US-Israeli imposed] war more than 100,000 rescuers volunteered to provide relief services,” IRNA quoted Castellanos Mosquera as saying.

The official made the remarks in a meeting with Kolivand, on Saturday.

The IRCS measures and activities over the past years and the forty-day war have been brilliant. The IRCS is a valuable society in the region, “We are proud of you,” he stated.

The official went on to say that the IRCS has observed all the humanitarian principles in its missions while maintaining the quality of services provided to those affected by the war has been its top priority. “You have a golden society, and it is an honor to learn so many new things from you,” he noted.

The IFRC has put the priority on showcasing the IRCS capabilities, specialized staff and professional volunteers to international societies.

Castellanos Mosquera also highlighted that the IFRC and other international societies will do their best to assist the IRCS. He said the IRCS is not alone. The IFRC is the representative of 191 national societies, and they will support the IRCS based on humanitarian principles.

MT /MG