2024 China Automation Congress opens in Qingdao

Leading Chinese experts and academics gathered in the coastal city of Qingdao in east China on Friday for the 2024 Chinese Automation Congress, highlighting emerging technologies including embodied artificial intelligence (AI).

The congress, sponsored by the Chinese Association of Automation (CAA), brings together nearly 20 academicians and 300 experts to discuss topics covering embodied AI, industrial internet, brain-computer interfaces, and intelligent robotics.

The event features 10 keynote speeches and 46 parallel sessions on industrial large models, smart manufacturing, optimization of unmanned systems, and intelligent healthcare.

"The combination of automation and AI is forming a new type of productivity. Our future is being reshaped by AI and automation at a speed and complexity never seen before," said Zheng Nanning, member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and president of the Chinese Association of Automation. The Intelligent Science Achievement Exhibition at the conference displays domestic innovation achievements, including intelligent production lines, robotic dogs, humanoid robots, and motion capture drones, demonstrating China's latest advances in automation technology.

Middle school and primary school students also take a part in the congress, presenting their works on extending science. "Among the top participants of the congress, the most cutting-edge or the most challenging subject now should extend to what we call embodied intelligence, which covers a comprehensive ability of us humans to handle complex problems, including various abilities, perceptions, responses and adaptabilities," said Li Shaoyuan, vice president of Qingdao University of Science and Technology.

2024 China Automation Congress opens in Qingdao

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the Russian Federation on Saturday released press statements, respectively, on the common grounds reached during a strategic dialog between their foreign ministers in Moscow on Friday.

The press release by the Korean Central News Agency said that during the dialog between DPRK Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, the two sides expressed the common understanding that "the root cause of ever-escalating tensions in the Korean Peninsula, Northeast Asia and other parts of the world lies in the provocations of the United States and its vassal countries."

The foreign ministers of the DPRK and Russia agreed to hold more dialogs between external policy organs of the two countries, including the ministerial strategic dialog, at various levels, it said.

The Russian Foreign Ministry's press release said that during the strategic consultations, the two ministers "had a thorough exchange of opinions on the practical issues of developing the bilateral relations."

The Russian side expressed "full support of the measures being taken by the state leadership of the DPRK to contain the aggressive policy of the United States and its satellites," and to ensure peace and stability in the region, it said.

It also said that the foreign ministers' strategic consultations "make an important contribution to further development and expansion of the bilateral relations in line with the comprehensive strategic partnership between the Russian Federation and the DPRK."

DPRK, Russia release press statements on FM strategic dialog