Geneva Summit 2026 · 12–14 August · Assembly Hall · Palais des Nations
AI for Developing Countries — decided with the majority in the room.
500+ delegates from 150+ nations, three days in the Assembly Hall of the United Nations Office at Geneva. Free to the world. Admission by selection.
Co-convened by the Swiss Chinese Law Association (SCLA) — a Geneva-headquartered nonprofit community of 500+ legal professionals, CEOs and government officials — together with AIFOD, the AI for Developing Countries Forum.
SCLA is a non-governmental, non-profit organization established in 2019 in Geneva, committed to global justice and to ensuring access to legal rights for communities worldwide. Convening this Summit — where the legal frameworks governing AI in the developing world are drafted and adopted — is a direct expression of that mission. Learn more about SCLA →
Visit scla.worldParticipation is free. Admission is by selection.
The Summit carries no fee — it is free to the world. But the Assembly Hall holds a finite number of seats, and we select every delegate who fills one.
Apply now
One form, two minutes. Tell us who you are and what you would contribute.
We review & select
SCLA and AIFOD review every application. Selection balances region, sector and contribution.
Selected candidates are accredited
Successful applicants receive the official UN Indico registration link and the accreditation pathway by email.
Collect your badge, take your seat
Badge collection at Pregny Gate from 11 August. Opening ceremony 12 August, 09:30 CEST.
The legal profession, carried into the room.
The Summit is not adjacent to SCLA's work — it is SCLA's work. A treaty text drafted, debated and adopted in three days requires exactly what our community was founded to provide: legal drafting, dispute-resolution architecture, and pro-bono expertise for the jurisdictions the frameworks will govern.
DraftingThe Compact drafting committee
SCLA members — practising counsel, arbitrators and academics — staff the drafting committee that turns track outcomes into the treaty language of the Geneva Compact, article by article, before it is put to the plenary.
SelectionDelegate review
Every delegate application is reviewed jointly by SCLA and AIFOD. Selection balances region, sector and contribution, so that the room reflects the populations the frameworks will affect.
Dispute resolutionGIDI and Article IV
Through the Geneva International Dispute Resolution Institute (GIDI), established under SCLA's Global Forum, the Compact's cooperative-governance mechanism (Art. IV) is grounded in a working institution for swift, accessible resolution of cross-border disputes.
Pro bonoLegal support for developing regions
SCLA's standing commitment to pro-bono legal assistance in developing regions — aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals — continues after the closing plenary, carrying the Compact into national implementation.
The world's AI decade, decided with the majority in the room.
Content moderation trained on English fails in Yoruba. Medical AI trained on North American data misdiagnoses in Nairobi. Model licences drafted in one jurisdiction quietly define what is legal in a hundred others. On 12–14 August 2026, the Summit convenes the room where those frameworks are drawn — a working assembly with the mandate to leave with a document adopted, not merely a communiqué issued. SCLA carries the legal profession into that room; AIFOD convenes the nations.
Three days. Diagnosis, deliberation, action.
Wed 12 Aug · Diagnosis
The state of the world's AI, told by those who use it.
- Opening ceremony, Assembly Hall
- Keynote & plenary on Global South AI
- Country and regional reports
- Working-track launches
Thu 13 Aug · Deliberation
Parallel tracks. Drafting rooms. Real disagreement.
- Six parallel working tracks
- Drafting committee sessions
- Cross-track report-back plenary
- Civil-society hearing
Fri 14 Aug · Action
The Geneva Compact, put to the room.
- Draft review, plenary debate
- Adoption ceremony — Geneva Compact
- Handover to Nairobi 2027
- Closing, Assembly Hall
Four questions the room must answer.
Access to Compute
Public compute infrastructure, cross-border access, and the economics of who trains what, and where.
Language Inclusion
Seven thousand living languages; fewer than a hundred supported by frontier models. What obligation follows.
Development Applications
AI in health, agriculture, climate and education for contexts the systems were not designed for.
Sovereignty & Voice
The right to define, deploy and govern AI in the interest of one's own people — made enforceable.
The Geneva Compact.
Not a communiqué — a working treaty text, drafted and adopted in the Assembly Hall over three days, then handed forward to Nairobi 2027. SCLA's drafting committee holds the pen.
The Geneva Compact
Done in the Assembly Hall, Palais des Nations
Data Infrastructure
The right of a nation to hold, route and audit the data on which its AI is trained.
Model Access
Terms under which frontier models must be accessible to public and academic use.
Linguistic Rights
Models deployed at population scale must support the languages of their users.
Cooperative Governance
A South–South and North–South review mechanism, rotating annually between capitals — anchored in GIDI, SCLA's Geneva International Dispute Resolution Institute.
Public Compute
A shared, sovereign-managed compute pool for research and public-interest deployment.
·2026·
Who sits in the Assembly Hall.
National Delegations
Cabinet-level and ministerial representatives, coordinated through permanent missions.
Permanent Missions
Geneva-based diplomatic corps carrying the Compact into ongoing UN processes.
Multilateral Institutions
UNCTAD · ILO · UNESCO · WIPO · ITU · WHO · UNIDO · OHCHR.
Legal & Industry Leaders
Through SCLA, the legal profession, civil society and industry join the working sessions.
Assembly Hall. Palais des Nations.
Hosting a summit on AI here is a deliberate signal — that the questions of who governs artificial intelligence, and for whom, belong at the same table where states have negotiated the terms they live by since 1929.
- Capacity
- ~2,000 seats
- Languages
- Six UN official languages
- Access
- Pregny Gate · Delegate badge
- Accreditation
- UN Indico · Security review