China Rejects U.S. Pressure to Choose Sides in the AI Race

China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said Beijing opposed forcing countries to choose sides in the U.S.-China artificial intelligence competition. At a regular briefing on August 19, he called for respect for every country’s “digital sovereignty” and said governments should be free to choose AI cooperation partners based on their own national conditions and development needs. 16

What Lin Jian said

Lin rejected what China described as a camp-based or zero-sum approach to AI cooperation. The central message was that artificial intelligence should not become a reason for countries to be pushed into opposing geopolitical blocs.

China’s position, as reported from the briefing, was threefold:

• Countries’ digital sovereignty should be respected.
• Governments should decide which AI partners to work with according to their own circumstances.
• States should not be forced to take sides or participate in rival AI camps. 16

The remarks responded to reports that Washington planned to tell countries participating in a U.S.-backed AI initiative that they could not simultaneously join a competing framework associated with Beijing. 26

What the reported U.S. policy involved

Reuters reported on August 14 that the U.S. was preparing a letter for the 35 signatories of its “AI Opportunity Statement.” The coalition was described as focusing on cooperation involving AI models, semiconductors, and critical minerals. 2

According to the report, a draft of the letter warned that membership in Beijing’s competing AI framework would be incompatible with participation in the U.S.-led coalition. In practical terms, that would require participating countries to choose between the two initiatives rather than belong to both. 2

The wording matters: the reporting described a planned letter and a draft policy, not evidence that every recipient had already been formally excluded. China’s response was therefore aimed at a reported U.S. effort to establish exclusive alignment in AI cooperation. 12

Why third countries are central to the dispute

The dispute extends beyond Washington and Beijing because many countries may want access to technology, investment, expertise, infrastructure, or critical-mineral partnerships from both sides.

Reuters identified Kazakhstan as the only known participant in both the U.S. and Chinese groupings at that point. Its reported dual participation illustrated the kind of overlap the proposed U.S. warning was designed to address. 2

For countries trying to preserve flexibility, an either-or structure could narrow their options. For the United States and China, however, overlapping memberships may be viewed as a challenge to the cohesion of their respective AI partnerships. The available reporting establishes the competing policy positions, but it does not establish how widely any eventual U.S. restriction would be enforced or how countries would respond.

The broader significance

Lin Jian’s comments framed the disagreement as a question of digital sovereignty: whether governments should retain the ability to make independent technology and AI partnerships. The reported U.S. approach framed membership in its coalition more exclusively, linking participation to non-membership in duplicative competing initiatives. 126

That contrast signals a widening contest over more than AI models. It also concerns who sets the terms for international cooperation around chips, minerals, and technology partnerships. Still, the evidence available here concerns China’s public response and a reported draft U.S. communication; it does not by itself prove that the AI ecosystem has formally split into two closed blocs.