US Gives India Informal AI Access Pledge at Pax Silica Summit

When the US Commerce Department issued an export control directive on June 12 ordering Anthropic to halt access to its Fable 5 and Mythos 5 models for any foreign national, it surfaced a structural concern that partner governments had been quietly holding: any country integrating US AI into national digital infrastructure is exposed to sudden cutoffs driven by American national security decisions. That tension landed formally at the second Pax Silica summit in Washington on June 25, where India and 34 other countries signed the US-led initiative focused on secure AI supply chains and trusted technology ecosystems.

S. Krishnan, secretary of India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and leader of India's delegation, raised the concern directly at the summit. If AI is something 'which is to be used and made available, we can't have abrupt cutoffs,' he stated, according to South China Morning Post reporting. US officials responded with encouraging but carefully qualified language. Krishnan described receiving 'an understanding...that access to technology, once it is provided, will not be cut off. I think that was an assurance,' his own phrasing signaling diplomatic goodwill rather than a formal commitment.

The significance is partly in what India was willing to raise publicly. Krishnan's statement creates a record that access continuity is a live concern for Pax Silica partner states, not just a theoretical risk. Whether the other 34 signatories pressed US officials on similar points, or what response they received, the reporting does not say.

The honest caveat is the one Krishnan himself embedded in his language. As The Print reported, his characterization was an 'understanding,' not a formal guarantee, describing the US position as an assurance rather than a treaty or binding framework. A future national security review could override that informal goodwill. Countries building public services on US AI models are, in effect, betting that diplomatic relationships will hold faster than export policy can change.

If the US moves to formalize access continuity commitments, it would strengthen Pax Silica's proposition considerably. A credible no-cutoff pledge would make the initiative more attractive to the large democracies Washington most needs in its China-free supply chain.