Legal Aspects of the privatisation and commercialisation of space activities- Remote Sensing and National Space Legislation - Second Report

MAUREEN WILLIAMS

Report of the Seventy-Second Conference of the ILA - Toronto

International Law Association, Londres

Lugar: Londres., Reino Unido; Año: 2005;

Further to our last Conference in 2004 in Berlin a number of experts of international renown have joined this Committee. Our very warm welcome to Steven Freeland (Australia), Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz (USA), Ram Jakhu (Canada), Sergio Marchisio (Italy), David Sagar (UK) and Kai-Uwe Schrogl (Germany). The Committee regrets to announce the loss of one of its distinguished members, Professor Alexis Goh (Australia), who passed away in June 2005. Colleagues and friends shall ever remember Professor Goh for her friendliness, easy-going style and readiness to contribute to the work of the Committee with ideas of quality. Tribute was paid to her memory in ILA Newsletter N° 23 (July 2005). The Committee´s terms of reference for 2004-2006. Different stages This Second Report of the Space Law Committee aims at highlighting the most controversial issues addressed in our work submitted to the Berlin Conference, with the purpose of laying down the pillars for concrete proposals on remote sensing (RS) and national space legislation (NSL), to be presented to the ILA 73rd Conference in 2008. Both topics -of an unquestionable evolving nature- appear, in today´s international scene, very much linked. As anticipated in Berlin under the heading "Future Work of the Committee" of the Report, the Commitee further notes that remote sensing and national space legislation are being increasingly related to the registration of objects launched into outer space, an activity governed by the 1975 Registration Convention. This Convention, however, has been only timidly supported by the international community and calls for adjustments in order to be consistent with the present time. In fact, the various shortcomings of this text are now becoming a matter of concern at all levels -governmental and private, domestic and international- in view of the decreasing number of space objects being registered with the UN Secretary-General, as statistics clearly indicate. Therefore, over the nearly two years elapsed between the Berlin and Toronto Conferences, the Committee sensed the need to include registration issues in the context of this Second Report and, to be practical, link them to remote sensing and national space legislation from the initial stages of our work. Consequently, and following our traditional practice of circulating a Questionnaire to Committee members before embarking on the preparation of the Conference Report, three sections were included therein dealing, in turn, with state practice relating to remote sensing, national space legislation and registration.