Registration of Space Objects

The adoption and entering into force of the 1975 Convention on Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space (also known as the Registration Convention) was another achievement in expanding and strengthening the corpus iuris spatialis. It was the fourth treaty negotiated by the member states of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UN COPUOS) and it represents a lex specialis to the Outer Space Treaty (OST), elaborating further Articles V, VIII, and XI of the OST. Article V OST deals with safe and prompt return of astronauts in case of distress or emergency landing to the state of registry of their space vehicle, which is then further defined in the Registration Convention. Article VIII OST only implied registration and provided for the consequences thereof, namely in respect of exercising jurisdiction and control over a registered space object. However, the Registration Convention specified the ensuing obligations and regulated the necessary practical steps of space objects registration. The Registration Convention also complements and strengthens Article XI OST, which stipulates an obligation of state parties to inform the secretary-general of the nature, conduct, locations, and results of their space activities in order to promote international cooperation. The prevailing purposes of the Registration Convention is the clarification of “jurisdiction and control” as a comprehensive concept mentioned in Article VIII OST. In addition to its overriding objective, the Registration Convention also contributes to the promotion and the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes. Establishing and maintaining a public register reduces the possibility of the existence of unidentified space objects and thereby lowers the risk of putting, for example, weapons of mass destruction secretly into orbit. Notwithstanding these important objectives, the negotiation history of the Convention and its lower number of ratification compared to the previous three space treaties testify to the numerous challenges that surround registration. The mandatory marking of space objects was one of the most heated points of debate between member states during the drafting of the Convention in the 1970s. Member states had conflicting views, depending on whether they were launching states or potential victims of launch failures. Additionally, questions on whether there should be one central or several registers and whether the type of information to be registered should be obligatory or optional were also pivotal in the discussion. It took five years of negotiation for member states to reach compromises and to adopt the Registration Convention, containing 12 articles. The articles covered issues ranging from registration procedure and different registries to amendments and withdrawal from the Convention. In addition, the following novelties were introduced: a new definition on “state of registry” was included; the “Moscow formula” was abandoned as the depositary was moved to the UN; and the “in five years review” clause found in Article X signified that the drafters were anticipating that technological developments could have such an impact on the Convention’s provisions that shorter time span between reviews were required than in previous space treaties. Despite the Convention’s novelties and its objective to protect the attribution of jurisdiction and control on the basis of a registry, as well as to ensure the rights provided in the Liability Convention and the Rescue and Return Agreement by offering means to identify space objects, the articles dealing with joint launch registration and registration by Intergovernmental Organizations (IGOs) are seen as weakening jurisdiction and control concept. Due to the fact that jurisdiction and control stay only with the state of registry, the other launching states may only conclude appropriate agreements to retain any of these rights. Thus, international responsibility and liability remain with all the launching states, but jurisdiction and control only with the state of registry. Furthermore, in the case of an IGO, the IGO does not have the sovereign authority to exercise jurisdiction and control, thereby raising the question who could do so instead of or on behalf of an IGO. In this regard, the Convention leaves important areas unregulated. In the following years, there were proposals to expand the Registration Convention to encompass other subject matters such as financial interests of assets in outer space; however, up until today, these issues remain regulated only by the UNIDROIT Space Assets Protocol.

The Agreement on the Rescue and Return of Astronauts and the Return of Objects Launched into Outer Space (ARRA) of 1968 deals with the obligation of states toward astronauts in distress or in emergency situations and with the obligation to return space objects. It is the second of the five United Nations space treaties, after the Outer Space Treaty (OST) of 1967 and before the Liability Convention (LIAB) of 1972. The historical development of ARRA and how this agreement reflects the needs and interests of the two important space-faring nations at the time of its entry into force, the United States and the Soviet Union, are important factors for understanding the space race. ARRA is related to the OST and regards the various obligations of states concerning rescue and assistance as well as the return of astronauts, which stand in the middle between a general humanitarian duty and political and national security considerations. The return of space objects and the question of costs of rescue and return operations are important concerns and can be compared to the situation with the law of the sea, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) of 1982 and the Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules of Law Respecting Assistance and Salvage at Sea (Salvage Convention) of 1989. ARRA has never been applied with respect to accidents or distress of astronauts or cosmonauts but several times with respect to the recovering and returning of space objects. Finally, current challenges, such as the commercialization and privatization of outer space activities need to be addressed. This includes the increased interests of private individuals to enter outer space (so-called space tourism) and the question of the application of the ARRA to suborbital flights. Many legal challenges created by technological progress can be resolved via an evolving interpretation and application of the ARRA. Yet, some issues might warrant a new legal framework.

The responsibility of international organizations for internationally wrongful acts is by no means a field of international law that is ruled by consensus even on the level of the most basic norms of responsibility. This confusion is even more prevalent when an international organization acts in outer space. International law applicable for outer space activity is sometimes regarded as lexspecialis to general norms of responsibility without much further considerations. The aim of this contribution is to examine whether this statement has merit, in light of the Outer Space Treaty and the Liability Convention and the Articles of the Responsibility of International Organizations drafted by the International Law Commission. Based on a theoretical analysis––due to the lack of practice––, it can be concluded, that the joint and several responsibility regime created by the Outer Space Treaty, and the liability and––at the same time––international responsibility system of the Liability Convention are indeed lex specialis and this responsibility is by default shared in nature. This conclusion is valid only for damage caused by illegal space activity by space objects on the surface of the Earth and to aircraft in flight.

As the concept of commercial mining in space transitions into reality from theoretical discussions, the existing international legal framework is found inadequate. The Outer Space Treaty, being the Grund norm, provides several essential principles for space governance, which need to be adhered to to ensure orderly developments in space. Despite the strong reflection of the common rights regime in international space treaties, the failure to prohibit certain activities in explicit terms has resulted in varied interpretations of the provisions of space treaties. The permissibility of space mining by public or private entities and the claim of property rights over mined resources is one such domain of controversy. The last decade’s developments in domestic laws and international arrangements, like the Artemis Accords, have exemplified the concerns relating to space mining. The recent exchanges from the 67th session of the Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, focusing on the increasing necessity of a cohesive international framework, attain significance in this regard. Keywords: AstroForge – COPUOS – Outer Space Treaty – Private Space Activity – Space Mining

Collision Probability with Gaussian Mixture Orbit Uncertainty

Space law, as it now exists, is not an independent legal system. It is merely a functional classification of those rules of international law and of municipal law relating to outer space, natural or man-made objects in outer space, spacemen, and man’s activities in outer space. This chapter focuses on those rules of public international law which, by defining the legal status of outer space, space objects and spacemen, provide the international legal framework for the activities of States and of their astronauts in outer space.

The United Nations treaties on the exploration and use of outer space (“space treaties”) date back to the beginning of the space era, when space actives were limited and generally carried out by only a few governmental actors. At the time international space law was called to reply to specific needs of the international community, such as to protect against the establishment of State sovereignty in outer space, to prohibit its use for non-peaceful purposes, to define the rights and obligations of States with regard to space objects. The regulation of private activities were addressed, but only as a subject of authorization and supervision of a certain State (the “appropriate State”), that should also bear international responsibility for them.

The overarching theme of this article is not to revisit existing debates surrounding the application of jus ad bellum or jus in bello parameters to the “peculiarities” of outer space. Rather, this article examines the major treaties that regulate a States’ military activities in outer space (including, for example, the Outer Space Treaty, Limited Test Ban Treaty, Liability Convention and, PPWT), alongside Charter norms, such as Article 2(4)of the UN Charter, to pinpoint the threshold of breach, violation and incremental militarization of outer space. With respect to the PPWT, it is important to note at this juncture that it remains a “proposal”, and at best, lex ferenda. A natural consequence from this analysis will be to underscore the extent to which “toleration” of such violations by States, and the international community as a whole, has resulted in the incremental militarization of space.

Space Debris Mitigation

Real-time dim space target detection is a significant challenge in space situation awareness. This paper proposes a single-frame space object segmentation and detection method based on deep learning. Firstly, Channel and Space Attention U-net (CSAU-Net) is presented based on space image features. We remove unnecessary feature layers and add attention modules in the traditional encoder and decoder structure to enhance feature fusion and better use original feature layers. The proposed network structure can achieve accurate segmentation of space objects with fewer data training. At the same time, we construct a space target dataset for training, which contains targets with different signal-to-noise ratios to enhance the generalization of convolutional neural networks. After obtaining the segmentation masks, a simple connected component labeling method is applied to extract the centroid of the space target. Experiments show that our approach can achieve an ideal segmentation effect when the signal-to-noise ratio of the space target in the simulated dataset is 0.3. In addition, the proposed algorithm can realize fast segmentation and achieve an accuracy of 98.5%, which is similar to the traditional multi-frame space target detection method in real space image detection.

Intellectual Property Protection in Outer Space: Conflict in Theory and Application in Practice

Militarization of outer space is one of the most complex challenges to global peace, harmony, and security in the 21st century. Initially, recognized as a subject area of scientific exploration and constructive engagement, outer space has progressively become a critical zone for defense competition among major powers. The arrangement of multi-domain satellites, development of anti-satellite weapons (ASAT) and creation of autonomous defense structure by powerful nations like USA, China, Russia and India. These countries have shifted from the peaceful uses to framework conceived in 1967 Outer Space Treaty. This evolving militarization intimidates to rebuild space into a war zone and risk of conflict beyond boundaries. The existing international skeleton secured by the Outer Space Treaty, like the Convention on Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space 3235(XXIX), was created in a time when space capabilities were limited. These treaties restrain the installation of weapon of mass destruction in orbit but are still silent on the usage of cyber-based weapons in space. This vagueness created an inadequacy that states can justify their military activities as a self-defense or technological advancement. To safeguard outer space as a global collective good, there is an urgent need for recommencing diplomatic engagement, stronger transparency measures and development of a comprehensive international legal authority addressing both military and non-military threats. Preserving space as a peaceful and collective land is crucial for global security as well as collective survival of humankind.

This chapter outlines the legal considerations involved in the commercial exploitation and utilisation of the International Space Station (ISS) from a German legal perspective. It demonstrates the sources and content of those rules as they apply to ISS commercial operations in situations where German law is the governing law. The multi-party nature of the ISS leaves scope for the applicability of various national rules of law in specific situations where the Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) so provides, whether or not the ISS operations are commercial. Article VI of the Outer Space Treaty (OST) imposes a duty upon states to guarantee authorisation and supervision of space operations and activities at national level, in accordance with treaty law. Achieving legal certainty over proprietary rights and conflicts of laws through the medium of national or European space legislation remains an essential means of encouraging commercial utilisation of the ISS. Keywords: commercial utilisation; German legal perspective; Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA); International Space Station (ISS); Outer Space Treaty (OST)

Space and Soviet military planning

According to the Convention on International Liability for Space Damage, drawn up in Moscow, London and Washington on 29 March 1972 in the event of damage being caused elsewhere than on the surface of the Earth to a space object by a space object of another launching State, the latter shall be liable only if the damage is due to its fault or the fault of persons for whom it is responsible. Therefore, every state is liable on the basis of the fault for damages which were caused by a space object dispatched from its territory. For this reason, the draft Act on space activities and the National Register of Space Objects of 10 July 2017 allows the State Treasury to raise a recourse claims for damages which were caused by a space object, from the owner of that space object, and if the operator is found to be guilty of causing damages, also from this operator to its full value. Moreover, this draft obliges the owners of space object to have compulsory third part liability insurance. Unfortunately, the last mentioned provision remains extremely laconic, and the compulsory third party liability insurance applicable to space objects will not be subject – per analogiam – to the provisions of the Act on Compulsory Insurance, the Insurance Guarantee Fund and the Polish Motor Insurers’ Bureau of 22 May 2003 as it is the case of motor vehicles.