China's Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Science and Technology published a draft on October 16, 2026 that would add 40 technologies to the national export control catalogue, 23 of them in artificial intelligence, with 14 technologies prohibited and 26 restricted across the full catalogue. The AI items cover large models, agents, chip designs, and computing clusters, and bring model weights and source code into scope, with models at 2 trillion parameters or above, or with world-leading capability, facing restriction. Public consultation runs to November 15, 2026, and an interim pre-export registration requirement is already in force.

Access through APIs, websites, apps, and software as a service is exempt, as is technology already public through open source releases or papers, with automatic licensing possible for some open source and overseas operations. The Associated Press also noted progress between the United States and China on AI safety dialogue and an incident notification mechanism.

Sources: Associated Press via Akron News Reporter; AI Weekly (reporting Bloomberg)