Science ministry and World Bank open AI summit in Seoul with 60-nation ministerial

The science ministry said Monday it will co-host a Global AI and Digital Summit with the World Bank in Seoul this week, bringing senior officials from about 60 countries to a ministerial meeting on artificial intelligence and digital cooperation.

The Ministry of Science and ICT said the four-day event, which opens Monday and runs through Thursday at the Grand Hyatt Seoul, is the first AI and digital summit the World Bank has held outside the United States. Deputy Prime Minister and Science Minister Bae Kyung-hoon and World Bank Digital Vice President Kim Sang-bu will chair the ministerial session together under the theme "From Ambition to Action."

Delegates will work through three agenda items: widening digital inclusion and access, using AI to overhaul public services, and building innovative AI ecosystems. The chairs plan to issue a joint statement setting out the discussion and the direction for future cooperation.

The ministerial is the first day's business. A policy forum and an exhibition of AI and digital technology from Korean and foreign companies follow on Tuesday and Wednesday, and overseas participants finish on Thursday with site visits to institutions including the Korea Water Resources Corporation and Seoul National University Bundang Hospital.

The Seoul meeting builds on a relationship the two institutions have been developing in the AI field. The World Bank opened a global AI and digital knowledge center in Songdo in December 2025, and a fund financed by the Korean government supports AI conversion in developing countries.

Seoul is also pushing to assemble a global AI hub in Korea by gathering the AI cooperation centers of six multilateral development banks, among them the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the African Development Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the Central American Bank for Economic Integration. The government says the hub would contribute to the World Bank's goal of extending digital access to 1 billion people by 2030.

The wider program, which the finance ministry said would draw about 900 people from more than 160 countries, includes the World Bank Group president and digital ministers. World Bank President Banga, in a meeting with Finance Minister Lee Hyung-il on Monday, described Korea as a country equipped with public financing, private capital and technology, and expressed a willingness to expand cooperation on Korean corporate investment in developing countries and on mobilizing private capital.

Bae framed the summit as a step from principle to practice in how countries govern AI. "We will actively cooperate with the international community so that the benefits of responsible AI use are shared evenly across humanity," he said. "I hope this event becomes a meaningful venue for cooperation and communication that carries our vision for an international AI basic society into practical action."

Second Vice Science Minister Ryu Je-myung was scheduled to introduce Korean AI policies, including AI for All, at a high-level exchange session and dinner on Monday, the ministry said. Vice Interior Minister Kim Min-jae and Um Yeol, head of the ministry's AI policy office, will share Korean policy experience at the forum on Wednesday.