Mattarella: human rights are not subordinated to politics, risks from AI

Protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms, rule of law and strengthening of the international legal order, risks of AI, multilateralism as the only alternative to a return to "barbarism". The President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella, in the frescoed halls of the Quirinale, talks about this and much more while receiving a delegation from the World Jurist Association and the World Law Foundation, led by President Javier Cremades, from whose hands in May 2027 he will receive the 'World Peace & Liberty Award' in Tirana.

"The inviolable rights of the person and the fundamental principles of the legal system cannot be subordinated to the contingencies of political decision, since they constitute an expression of human dignity", warns the Head of State. Then he returns to the risks associated with the development of digital technologies, with even clearer words than those uttered just 24 hours ago. Mattarella shines a light on the "responsibility of States and supranational bodies, with the need to restore their lost authority with respect to private entities of immense financial and technological power outside of any rules and objectives of general interest".

It is their "responsibility and duty to deliver the future into the hands of the new generations and not to machinery that can take it away from them". The President reflects on legal civilization together with his guests: "Law must represent the foundation and draw the limit and measure of the exercise of power. The experience of twentieth-century totalitarianism - he recalls - has shown, with dramatic evidence, that formal legality alone is not sufficient to guarantee the rule of law. From that tragic historical lesson, the awareness has developed that the inviolable rights of the person and the fundamental principles of the legal system cannot be subordinated to the contingencies of political decision, since they constitute an expression of human dignity".

Mattarella returns to exalt the "strength and relevance" of our Constitution. Once again he indicates the main road in the European political project, denounces the "unheard of attempts to delegitimize the International Courts and their Judges", sees cooperation and multilateralism as "a necessity of the present", because "the alternative is that of perennial conflict, with a return to barbarism in international relations".

"History has already dramatically shown us the most tragic consequences of a drift of this nature", the Head of State never tires of repeating, thanking his guests for the "contribution of great importance - even more important in the times we live in - to the consolidation of an international community founded on respect for the dignity of every person, through dialogue and cooperation".