This essay was originally published by the Eurasia Daily Monitor of  The Jamestown Foundation on 8 April 2020, and is republished here with their kind permission. The original essay can be found here.

Belarus and Russia have signed an agreement to jointly build a constellation of eight high-resolution Earth observation satellites, according to Belarusian and Russian news media sources.

On 6 April 2020, US President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order (EO) on Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources.

Berlin-based Exolaunch, a leading launch services and deployment system provider for small satellites, revealed on 14 April 2020 that it has signed a rideshare launch services agreement with SpaceX.

Responding to President Donald J. Trump’s Executive Order on Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources, Russian government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, the personal press secretary of Russian President Vladimir Putin, told the TASS news agency that any attempt at “privatizing” space would be considered “unacceptable.”

Three Proton-M launch vehicles have been returned from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to their manufacturer in Moscow after newly introduced Roscosmos quality control measures found defective components and parts in them.

Hong Kong Aerospace Technology Group (HKATG) announced it aims to launch the "Golden Bauhinia No.1" low-orbit high frequency satellite in June from China. The planned launch marks an important milestone in the company's "Golden Bauhinia" space remote sensing project.

Hanley Wood | Meyers Research, the housing industry's foremost advisors and provider of rich data, has announced it acquired Bird.i, a Scotland-based company that combines the latest satellite imagery and artificial intelligence (AI) technology to provide valuable land and building insights.

Axelspace Corporation, the Japanese satellite Earth observation company, announced on 3 April 2020 an agreement with Tokio Marine Holdings Inc., Hiroshima University, and Hydro Technology Institute Co., Ltd., on a joint research initiative into the prediction of red tide outbreaks that could potentially cause damage to marine resources

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