Space arms control treaty unlikely in near-term: US

July 14, 2010 at 10:22 am | Posted in Space Law Current Events | Leave a comment

by Sara M. Langston with the blog faculty

GENEVA, July 13, 2010 (AFP) – The United States said Tuesday that a space arms control treaty was unlikely to emerge in the near future as it still sees flaws in drafts being tabled at the moment.

“I don’t see any near-term progress on a space arms control treaty, but again I think there is a lot of shared interest between the US, Russia, China and others on providing space stability,” said Frank Rose, deputy assistant secretary of state at the Bureau of Verification, Compliance and Implementation.

“There are a lot of near-term confidence building measures that we hope to work with Russia and China on,” he told journalists after addressing the UN Conference on Disarmament.

Russia and China had proposed a new treaty to ban the use of weapons in space in 2008, but the United States maintained that it is a “flawed document.”

Rose pointed out that one sticking point was that it does not ban land-based anti-satellite capabilities…more