MOSCOW, June 28. /TASS/. The UN has so far succeeded in bringing countries together to work out global governance of artificial intelligence (AI), UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in an exclusive interview with TASS First Deputy Director General Mikhail Gusman.

"I was able to bring 49 people from governments, from the academia, from the companies, from the civil society, and they were able to come to an agreement on governance of AI at [the] global level that, of course, has some [a] limited dimension. Many aspects will be done country by country according to the country's capacities and policies. But it was possible to bring them together. No other organization in the world will be able to bring together Americans, Russians, Chinese, Israelis, Africans, etc. and come to an agreement on a central issue of our time," the UN chief said.

According to Guterres, this is where he sees the UN's power. "Power is not the exercise of power by brute force. Power is to bring together the people that is people of goodwill, and to do that according to the values that created the United Nations," the top UN official explained. "I was able to bring together 49 people from all [over the world], from north and south, men and women. Of course, 49 means that there is one more of each, and with Russians, Americans, Chinese, Israelis, Brazilians, from all over the world, to look into how we can have some form of governance to make AI a force for good and not a problem for the world, and how, what we can then do for that," Guterres pointed out.

"The Secretary General of the United Nations has very little power, not as the power of a head of state of an important company, and not much money. But there are two things that the Secretary General of the United Nations has: one is a voice. But that voice is only important if that voice is faithful to the United Nations Charter, to international law. And that voice is at the service of those who are underprivileged in this world, those who are victims of inequality in this world. And at the same time, we have a certain convening capacity to bring together people of goodwill to address the challenges of our time," he concluded.