France, Germany and Italy have come to an agreement on the future regulation of artificial intelligence, according to a joint paper.

The agreement should speed up European negotiations on the AI Act presented by the European Parliament in June, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing the joint paper it had seen.

All three countries are in favour of "binding voluntary commitments for both large and small AI providers" in the EU, the news agency said.

The French, German and Italian governments were against the European Parliament's earlier proposal that the code of conduct should only apply to major AI providers in the first instance.

They believed this could erode trust in smaller providers' security and lead to fewer customers.

The paper seen by Reuters said that no sanctions would be imposed against providers who violated the code of conduct in the first instance.

However, if violations were made after a certain time frame had elapsed, a system of sanctions could then be implemented. This would be monitored by a European authority in future.

Laws should regulate the application of AI rather than AI itself, according to Germany's Economy Ministry, which manages the issue jointly with the Ministry of Digital Affairs.

AI will be on the agenda at the German government's digital summit in Thuringia this Monday and Tuesday and when the German and Italian governments meet in Berlin on Wednesday.