High-level panel discussion on AI - Villa Europa

29.10.2026

Artificial intelligence, its growing impact on diplomacy, humanitarian action and multilateral cooperation

Lively discussion at Villa Europa on the challenges of international cooperation on artificial intelligence. As part of the Festival della Diplomazia 2026 Diplomacy in Rome, the European Union hosted the Head of our AI Office Lucilla Sioli, the US Ambassador to the Holy See Brian Burch, the Secretary of the Holy See’s Dicastery for promoting integral human development Jozef Barlaš and the CIO of the UN’s WFP Kenn Crossley as well as students of global governance and international relations studying in Rome.

The potential of AI and the need for human-centric regulation was at the centre of our debate. The EU’s AI Act is the first continent-wide regulatory framework for the development, deployment and use of safe, ethical and trustworthy AI. The EU is also signatory of the Council of Europe’s Framework Convention on AI, the first legally binding international treaty on AI, which has been signed, next to the EU, by 20 countries so far, including the US, Japan, Canada, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, Ukraine, San Marino and Uruguay. Pope Leo XIV’s encyclica « Magnifica Humanitas » inspired our exchanges in Rome.

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High-level panel discussion on AI - Villa Europa