The collapse of the trilogue on Tuesday reveals deep divisions over whether high-risk AI systems embedded in consumer products should be exempt from the world’s toughest AI rules.
After 12 hours of talks on Tuesday, EU member states and MEPs failed to agree on proposed changes to the bloc’s landmark artificial intelligence law. According to Reuters, the talks will resume in May.
“It was not possible to reach an agreement with the European Parliament” The Cypriot official said that Cyprus currently chairs the EU Council.
The failed session was the final political trilogue planned on the AI Omnibus, a package of amendments to the AI Act set to come into force in August 2024, as well as the GDPR, ePrivacy Directive and proposed changes to the Data Act. The Omnibus was designed as a competitiveness measure aimed at reducing the regulatory burden on businesses to help European companies keep up with their US and Asian rivals. Critics, who include a large coalition of privacy and civil rights organizations, argue that this is a rollback of hard-won protections dressed up as simplification.
A key unresolved question on Tuesday was whether high-risk AI systems embedded in products already regulated by EU product safety legislation – medical devices, toys, connected cars, industrial machinery – would be exempted from the additional requirements of the AI Law. The European Parliament, backed by industry groups, is calling for these systems to be covered only by existing sectoral rules. The Council, which represents member states, showed limited enthusiasm for such extensive discussions.
Omnibus has been subject to constant criticism Researchers and civil society organizations argue that weakening the key provisions of the AI law before it takes effect risks undoing one of Europe’s most distinctive regulatory assets. Michael McNamara, lead debater on Parliament’s AI Omnibus, admitted Interview with Tech Policy Press Overlapping regulations can be difficult to manage, but he warned that substituting AI governance for sectoral laws would ultimately “deregulates rather than simplifies.”
Civil society groups have been more direct. In mid-April, more than 40 organizations signed a letter to Parliament arguing that the proposed changes weaken the AI law’s fundamental rights protections, particularly for biometric identification systems, artificial intelligence used in schools and medical artificial intelligence. AI Law when it came into force it was widely regarded as setting the global standard.
The relevance behind the negotiation is the structure. The main obligations of the AI Act for high-risk AI systems are currently set to come into force in just three months from 2 August 2026. The whole point of the AI Omnibus is to push back this deadline to December 2, 2027 for stand-alone high-risk systems and August 2, 2028 for those included in regulated products.
A final political agreement, a formal Parliamentary vote, Council approval and publication in the Official Journal must all take place within weeks for this postponement to come into force before August.
If talks stall in May and no deal is reached by June, the original deadline will be August 2026. This means that companies relying on the Omnibus’ extended timelines will face immediate compliance obligations that many have not adequately prepared for – a scenario Brussels is working hard to avoid.
The omnibus also includes a widely supported measure: a ban on artificial intelligence systems that generate non-consensual intimate images, including child sexual abuse material. Added to this package Following the controversy over Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot going viral At the end of 2025, the possibilities, both the Parliament and the Council, were already adapted to this. Despite this area of consensus, the collapse of negotiations underscores how difficult the sectoral exclusion issue is.
The resumption of talks next month will determine whether the EU can still claim to be doing it in an orderly manner, or whether the world’s most ambitious AI regulation stumbles when the strictest rules are meant to bite.
