European AI firms reject US calls for slowdown, citing competitive motives

Europe's leading AI firm Mistral and others have accused US rivals of using safety concerns to entrench their dominance, rejecting Anthropic's calls for advanced developers to slow down as Europe struggles to catch up. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei urged firms to slow AI capability improvements and proposed an antitrust waiver for joint safety measures, citing existential risks. European companies and officials dismissed the move as self-serving, with Mistral saying incumbents push regulation to favor themselves over competitors. Europe has produced few frontier AI developers, relying heavily on US models, and policymakers see competitive risks in slowing development. German AI professor Kristian Kersting called the proposals "regulatory capture," while French finance minister Roland Lescure said he could clearly see the firms' self-interest.