China Calls AI Slowdown Warnings Fear Mongering

China's Foreign Ministry on Monday dismissed U.S. tech leaders' calls to slow AI development as fearmongering and a Cold War playbook.

Spokesperson Guo Jiakun was answering a Saturday essay by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and a public rebuke from President Trump. NBC News carried the briefing. Guo's line is a podium response, not a new Chinese AI statute and not a bilateral deal.

"Fearmongering, confrontation and malicious competition will only disrupt the process of global AI governance and serve no one's interests," Guo told reporters. Amodei's essay, titled "We Must Pace the Frontier," had already been endorsed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk.

Amodei argued companies should deliberately "slow the pace" of model improvement given the risks, and that a Chinese lead would pose grave danger. He also called for restricting key tech sales to China. President Trump told reporters the United States is leading China in AI and he wants to keep it that way because "whoever wins AI wins," while criticizing "very negative forces."

The same weekend, State Security Minister Chen Yixin said China must "accelerate the establishment of a system for preventing and controlling AI security risks." He called AI a new track for strategic rivalry and still urged international cooperation. State-run Global Times blasted the slowdown call as packed with containment provisions targeting China.

Trump and Beijing both rejected a coordinated pause, for different reasons. Xi and Trump are expected to meet on 24 September in Washington, where AI pacing is likely to come up.

Washington's other China AI file this month is CISA's distillation advisory on DeepSeek and Alibaba. The labs, meanwhile, have been talking up a joint standards body. Monday's MFA line says Beijing is not joining a shared slowdown before that meeting.