Legal Issues of Manned Space Station

Paper number

IAC-12,E7,7-B3.8,3,x13379

Author

Prof. Haifeng Zhao, Harbin Institute of Technology, China

Year

2012

Abstract

With the tremendous development of Chinese manned space project, Chinese own manned space station will fly up into space about in 2020. It will be the third country, after Russia and the United States, to independently launch a manned space station. However, at present China has only carried out a preliminary study about the legal issues of International Space Station. Overseas study of the space station is more in-depth, and its history is longer.   
   In addition, space station, as a critical stage of the manned space activities, is also applicable to the laws of manned spaceflight. Abroad scholars have done specialized study of the legal issues of manned space flight, and especially relevant are since 1988, some scholars under the lead of Professor Karl-Heinz Bochstiege, the director of University of Cologne Institute of Air and Space Law in Germany, Professor Stephen Gorove, from the University of Mississippi, and the Professor Vladlen Vereshchetin of former Soviet Academy of Law Institute, after a long-term research, drew up a Draft Convention on Manned Space Flight. According to the decision of the Council of the International Institute of Space Law in October 1990, the Draft had been submitted to the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. This is an important step in the manned space law. Addition, University of Cologne Institute of Air and Space Law in Germany held a seminar in May 1992, took the legal issues of manned space flight as the theme, and scholars from various countries submitted dozens of papers on many aspects of manned space flight. 
   This paper will focus on a series of legal issues to be solved and will propose some solutions. It will deepen the study on the legal theory of the space station, and will promote the development of Chinese space law and policy. In practice, it will attempt to provide theoretical support for the relevant decisions for Chinese space station construction and operation. Through the research of this subject, it will provide a decision basis for solving our legal issues of space station construction, launch, operation, and developing strategies and ideas of international cooperation.

Abstract document

IAC-12,E7,7-B3.8,3,x13379.brief.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-12,E7,7-B3.8,3,x13379.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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