China hands over upgraded MAZU early warning solution to Djibouti

The China Meteorological Administration (CMA) on Friday officially handed over an upgraded version of MAZU, China's artificial intelligence (AI)-powered meteorological early warning solution, to Djibouti at a meteorological sub-forum of the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference and High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance in Shanghai.

In July 2025, China donated MAZU-Urban, an AI-powered early warning system for multi-hazard disaster prevention, to Djibouti. It became the first version of MAZU deployed in that country.

The upgraded version combines an intelligent terminal incorporating meteorological chips and forecasting models with the existing system, forming an integrated solution for weather monitoring, forecasting and warning.

It improves forecast resolution from 9 km to 3 km, provides forecasts up to three days in advance and updates them every six hours. It also uses phased-array radar, AI forecasting models and Fengyun meteorological satellites to improve extreme weather monitoring and early warning.

The upgraded system is expected to be put into operation in Djibouti by the end of this year. The solution can also be adapted for cities, ports, airports and other weather-sensitive areas in developing countries.

"We are a semiarid country. We get floods, we get heatwave, we got cycle. We have so many disasters. So this MAZU will help us a lot," said Ismail Nour, director-general of the Djibouti National Meteorological Agency.

MAZU, an acronym for Multi-hazard, Alert, Zero-gap and Universal, is China's cloud-based AI early-warning solution. Jointly developed by the World Meteorological Organization and the China Meteorological Administration (CMA), it aims to provide timely and convenient weather and climate services while supporting multi-hazard risk reduction across regions.

"We will also leverage multilateral platforms of international organizations such as the World Meteorological Organization to develop the MAZU solution into a globally accessible public meteorological service product, contributing Chinese strength to global climate governance and sustainable development," said Zhang Xingying, director of the Department of International Cooperation under the CMA.

The meteorological sub-forum gathered guests from 18 countries and regions and six international organizations to discuss how AI empowers early warnings for all in response to climate change.

At the event, the China-Thailand Joint Laboratory for Intelligent Prediction and Early Warning of Meteorological Disasters was launched. According to the CMA, it is the world's first bilateral international laboratory dedicated to AI-driven meteorological applications.

In addition, China released the Fenghe meteorological service large language model and launched a global open-source plan at the forum. The plan aims to promote open sharing, strengthen international cooperation on disaster risk reduction, and broaden access to AI-enabled meteorological services.

This year, the 2026 World AI Conference runs from Friday to Monday under the theme of "AI Partnership for a Brighter Future."

The CMA set up a booth at the Shanghai World Expo Exhibition and Convention Center to showcase the application effectiveness of MAZU, its innovative achievements in meteorological AI, and application scenarios in the meteorological service industry, while sharing China's experience in early warnings and disaster prevention and mitigation.

China hands over upgraded MAZU early warning solution to Djibouti

A China-led global initiative on mutual trust and interconnectivity among artificial intelligence (AI) agents was released on Friday in Shanghai, aiming to build broad consensus and work with global partners toward an open, trustworthy, secure, and inclusive agent ecosystem.

The initiative was put forward by the Cyberspace Administration of China, in collaboration with relevant authorities, during the main forum of the 2026 World AI Conference (WAIC) and High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance, which kicked off on Friday.

Mutual trust, interconnectivity, and interoperability are the three keywords of the initiative. The extent to which these dimensions are realized in AI agents -- one of the most transformative technological forms of the AI era -- is profoundly shaping the integration of the global digital economy and the future of human society, according to an Chinese expert in the field.

Under the global cooperation initiative, "mutual trust" serves as the foundation for agent collaboration, "interconnectivity" provides the channel, and "interoperability" establishes the rules of engagement, it is explained.

AI agents are widely seen as the next frontier in technology, following large language models. Unlike models that simply wait for prompts and respond, agents can actively sense their surroundings, map out tasks, call on external tools, and continuously iterate their performance. Yet as the capabilities of a single agent keep expanding, the real headache now is how well multiple agents can work together.

That is precisely why mutual trust, interconnectivity, and interoperability have become indispensable conditions for effective collaboration among agents.

On the industry front, the initiative's implementation is poised to redraw the global AI landscape. Experts said that the AI agent market is increasingly tilting toward dominance by several tech giants, who use closed ecosystems to lock in both users and developers. By championing standardization and open interoperability, however, China's approach offers smaller enterprises and independent developers a new path to participate equitably in the intelligent industry.

"AI is a shared asset of all humanity. Its development should never be a solo act by any one country -- it has to be a symphony of global collaboration. The vision of extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits breaks with the old zero-sum mindset, champions a new paradigm of win-win collaboration, and provides the most solid foundation and the clearest pathway toward a fairer and more equitable global AI governance system. This is not just China's proposal -- it is the wisdom that belongs to the whole world," said Zhang Yitian, dean of the Institute for Artificial Intelligence Development and Governance at Harbin Institute of Technology.

China-led global initiative unveils framework for AI agent collaboration rules