Picture of Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Espen Barth Eide by NOVAP (for use in media).

The EU AI Act Mentioned as Important by the Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs

Espen Barth Eide mentioned the importance of the EU AI Act to Norway in a speech made the 15th of November saying that Norway is preparing for implementation

Alex Moltzau
2 min readNov 15, 2023

--

This article is an excerpt from the speech from the new Norwegian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Espen Barth Eide, to the Parliament of Norway on the 15th of November. You can find the full speech in Norwegian here:

Note: the ‘President’ mentioned in the speech is the President of the Norwegian Parliament.

“Artificial intelligence will provide great opportunities — for individuals, for business and for the public sector. We must facilitate innovation and development. At the same time, we must ensure a safe framework, ethical use and compliance with human rights and democratic principles.

We need good regulation of artificial intelligence. That is why we have given input to, and are closely following, the EU’s work with a regulation on artificial intelligence. It may also apply to Norway through the EEA Agreement.

Negotiations are still ongoing in the EU. It seems to be a good set of regulations, which corresponds well with the government’s priorities. The proposal is intended to promote innovation while the regulations should contribute to the responsible development and use of artificial intelligence.

The proposal is based on the fact that the higher the risk an artificial intelligence system poses to society and individuals, such as risks linked to health, safety and fundamental rights, the stricter the rules must also apply.

The regulations will provide provisions on sales and use of systems with artificial intelligence. Furthermore, national market monitoring, supervision and sanctions are regulated. A separate artificial intelligence body in the EU is also proposed, which will have coordinating and advisory tasks.

Then we should remember, President, that Europe is in many ways an “island” between the United States on the one hand and China on the other in this matter. It is important that Europe follows its lead. For example, privacy concerns are taken care of much more strongly in the EU than in both the USA and China.

The EU is working to adopt the regulation in the coming months. We are well underway with preparations for incorporation of the regulation into the EEA agreement and implementation in Norwegian law.”

This is also part of my personal project #1000daysofAI and you are reading article 520. I am writing one new article about or related to artificial intelligence for 1000 days. The first 500 days I wrote an article every day, and now from 500 to 1000 I write at a different pace.

--

--

Alex Moltzau
Alex Moltzau

Written by Alex Moltzau

Policy Officer at the European AI Office in the European Commission. This is a personal Blog and not the views of the European Commission.

Responses (1)