UK, Ukraine sign declaration to develop 'AI-enabled armed forces'

The UK has signed a partnership with Ukraine to develop next-generation, AI-enabled armed forces, according to a statement on Monday.

The British government issued a Joint Declaration of Intent with Ukraine on a UK-Ukraine Artificial Intelligence Partnership following a meeting between Prime Minister Andy Burnham and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The declaration stated that the leaders recognised that Ukraine’s defence, resilience and unparalleled operational experience represent a crucial contribution not only to its own sovereignty and territorial integrity, but also to the stability and security of the eastern flank of Europe, NATO and the Euro-Atlantic community.

It noted that both countries should advance together, combining Ukraine’s battlefield experience with the UK’s technological, industrial and research strengths “to build the AI-era armed forces our two nations, and our allies, will depend on.”

“We will act as close partners in developing next-generation, AI-enabled armed forces – leveraging our engineering, industry, academic capacity and defence organisations’ expertise to accelerate the development and deployment of AI-enabled military capabilities that strengthen Ukraine’s battlefield advantage and support the development of next-generation AI-driven Armed Forces powered by rapid innovation, autonomous systems and network advantage.”

The declaration said the cooperation model will proceed through government-to-government collaboration on co-developed models; industry, coordinated through government-to-government arrangements to develop, test and deploy AI-enabled capabilities; and academia and research on autonomy, AI assurance, cybersecurity and synthetic data.

It added that the cooperation will respect the sovereignty of each party’s assets and data and that, by mutual agreement, the two countries will extend the outputs of this partnership to trusted allies and partners.

“This Declaration reflects our shared political intent and does not create legally binding obligations,” it concluded.