Policy and Law

French online national security news publication Intelligence Online is reporting that the recently created Saudi Space Agency is beginning to take shape under the leadership of Prince Sultan Bin Salman, the son of the reigning King Salman, half-brother of the Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, and first Saudi astronaut.

The UAE Space Agency and Krypto Labs have announced the two winning teams of the GeoTech Innovation Programme. The winners were awarded funding of AED100,000 (U.S.$27,250.00) in cash and AED500,000 (U.S.$136,125.00) in kind, as well as the opportunity to accelerate and transform their innovative ideas into commercially viable and scalable market-ready products and services.

United States Strategic Command and the Polish Space Agency signed an agreement for space situational awareness (SSA) services and data at the 35th Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado, 10 April 2019. Agreements like these lay the foundation that allows the United States to share information with allies and partners.

Following its 27 March 2019 direct-ascent antisatellite (ASAT) missile test that destroyed a target satellite in low-Earth orbit (LEO), the head of India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) – G. Satheesh Reddy – has outlined to Indian media his organisation's counterspace technology ambitions for the coming years.

Air Chiefs and senior space officials from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States held a meeting at Headquarters Air Force Space Command to discuss the future of the Combined Space Operations (CSpO) initiative on 10 April 2019.

Secure World Foundation is pleased to announce the inaugural Summit for Space Sustainability, which will be held in Washington, DC, on 25-26 June 2019.

Today’s interconnected world is ever more vulnerable to cyberattacks, emphasising the importance of secure encryption to protect Europe’s critical infrastructure and communications. An agreement forged today between the European Commission (EC) and the European Space Agency (ESA) marks the first steps towards creating a highly secure, pan-European quantum communication infrastructure.

Within the framework of participation in the 35th Space Symposium in Colorado, the Hellenic Space Agency (HSA) signed on 8 April 2019 a joint co-operation agreement with the U.S. space agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Boeing and the Australian Space Agency have signed a Statement of Strategic Intent to help advance the agency’s goals to expand Australia’s domestic space industry.

The second China-Arab States BDS Cooperation Forum was held in the Tunisian capital city of Tunis on 1 April 2019 to discuss measures and initiatives that will increase the use of China's Beidou navigation satellite system (BDS) in the Arab world with the aim of elevating cooperation in high-technology between China and the Middle East and North Africa.