US proposes AI incident alert system with China
The talks came before a meeting between Donald Trump and China’s Xi Jinping at the White House on 24 September.
The US has proposed a “notification mechanism” with China for artificial intelligence (AI) incidents that could affect national security, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said.
Bessent was speaking to reporters in New York on 20 September after talks with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, the Associated Press reported.
Bessent said the aim was a shared view of “common goals and common threats”, and that “moving from opaque to more transparency” between the world’s two leading AI powers was very important.
China’s state news agency, Xinhua, said the two delegations “held dialogues on AI-related issues”, without giving details.
Xinhua’s account did not mention the proposal or say whether China had accepted it.
The same account described the wider consultations on economic and trade issues as “candid, in-depth and constructive”.
He Lifeng led the Chinese delegation, while Bessent headed the US side alongside US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
Xinhua added that the two sides discussed “the implementation of consensus reached in previous talks”, guided by “the important consensus reached by the heads of state of the two countries”.
The talks took place ahead of a meeting between Donald Trump and China’s Xi Jinping at the White House on 24 September.
Bessent and Greer said the two sides had agreed to put into operation a new Board of Trade, an idea Trump and Xi had discussed at an earlier meeting in Beijing.
Greer said officials were still discussing which “nonsensitive” items could be considered for lower tariffs, a list that could include consumer and agricultural goods, energy products and medical devices.
