Policy and Law

As part of the new partnership between SpaceWatch Middle East and The Précis, we will occasionally be publishing selected articles from the publication. The Précis is a quarterly space law and policy report produced by Space Law & Policy Solutions, run by the prominent space lawyer and friend of SpaceWatch Middle East, Michael J. Listner. Reproduced here …

The Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) plans to create a joint remote earth sensing system by integrating the space- and ground-based capabilities of its member states, to include Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, by 2019. “In the first half of 2018, the Eurasian Economic Commission plans to draft an intergovernmental …

The Arab Satellite Communications Organization – Arabsat- participated in the Broadcast, Satellite and Digital Media Event for Middle East and North Africa, CABSAT 2017, during March 21-23, 2017, at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre. As an active member of the Satellite Interference Reduction Group (IRG), Arabsat sponsored the …

China has agreed to contribute U.S.$64 million to the Egyptian earth observation satellite programme, EgyptSat, as part of a new cooperation agreement between the two counties signed on March 21, 2017. The funding will be contingent on a feasibility study on the EgyptSat programme, but is thought to be a …

The case for the creation of a Kuwaiti space agency is growing with prominent Kuwaiti scientists advocating that the Gulf kingdom consider the merits of establishing a formal entity to deal with space issues. Quoted in the English-language newspaper Kuwait Times, scientist Dr. Hala Al-Jassar, an Assistant Professor in the …

Following immediately on the heels of Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is leading a delegation to China, arriving on March 19, 2017, in order to discuss and enhance strategic and economic ties between the two countries. Among the various topics to be discussed between Israel and …

As part of his six week-long tour of Asian countries, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia has presided over a major space agreement between his Kingdom and Asia’s leading space power, China. This prominent agreement is a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the King Abdulaziz City of Science …

Europe´s Copernicus programme has got its second eye. On Tuesday, March 7, 2017, at 02:49 am CET (March 6, 2017, at 10.49 pm local time), a Vega launcher successfully took off from the spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, carrying the satellite developed and built under the industrial leadership of Airbus …

The UAE is a young country that has fast transitioned into a global hub for producing knowledge. With its ‘Shuttle of Hope’, the country has re-affirmed that nothing is impossible. An interactive session titled ‘Above and Beyond Conventional Topics’ at the Public Diplomacy and Government Communication Forum, in Dubai on …

In a bizarre statement that will likely be studied for some time by strategic analysts seeking to understand how deterrence works, a senior officer in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) publicly announced that threats from the United States forced Iranian leadership to shelve plans to launch a space launch …