Tag Archives: Space Diplomacy

Airbus Defence and Space and the Government of the Côte d'Ivoire have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the French-headquartered company to help develop an aerospace sector in the African country that was once a French colony.

Italy’s largest private satellite manufacturer, SITAEL, is set to open its Australian headquarters on 1 July 2018 outside of Adelaide, South Australia, further cementing SA’s position as Australia’s premier New Space hub.

Russia has invited Turkey to send a Turkish national for Cosmonaut training, indicating that the relationship between these countries may now bear the substantial weight of ongoing human spaceflight cooperation obligations, despite difficulties on a number of issues, including Syria and the Armenia-Azerbaijani dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh.

Diplomatic efforts are gathering in the Middle East and North Africa toward the development of a regional mechanism for space cooperation and development among Arab countries. At the recent Global Aerospace Summit in Abu Dhabi, the region made progress toward establishing an Arab space organisation.

What are the prospects for Britain cooperating with other countries around the world to meet its satellite navigation needs after it leaves the European Union? Is such cooperation a good use of scarce financial and industrial resources for these countries? Dr. John B. Sheldon, Chairman and President of ThorGroup GmbH and publisher of SpaceWatch.Global, reports.

The Thai Ministry of Defence (MoD) is to take on national security space missions, and incorporate military space concepts of operations and their associated threats and opportunities in its defence strategy, operations, tactics, techniques, and procedures. According to Thai media reports, the MoD in Bangkok is considering options that include the leasing of an Earth observation satellite from a U.S.-based company and the introduction of space principles, operations, and concepts of operations throughout all Thai defence-related training and education in order to create a space savvy military.

China has issued an open invitation to all countries interested in participating in its planned orbital station in a bid to establish itself as a leading international space power and expand its influence. This step is especially significant at a time when NASA, the U.S. space agency, and its partners are trying to decide how long to maintain the International Space Station (ISS). The China Space Station is due to become operational as soon as 2022.

The South African Square Kilometer Array (SKA) has partnered with the Dutch optical telescope MeerLICHT to create the world's first combined radio and optical telescope – a kind of 'eyes and ears' approach to astronomy – that could provide huge advances in both astronomy and astrophysics.

Mongolia and France signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 18 May 2018 in order to carry out space cooperation at the institutional level between the Centre national d’études spatiales (CNES) and the Mongolian communication and information technologies authority (ACTI). The MoU was signed by Jean-Yves Le Gall, President of …

The US space agency, NASA, has officially launched a project to provide remote sensing data to Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, aiding regional environmental and population monitoring as part of a wider effort for sustainable resource management and planning in these countries.