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Whose Laws Apply On the ISS?
Hugh Pickens writes "Whose laws apply if astronauts from different countries get into a fight, make a patentable discovery, or damage equipment belonging to another country while on the International Space Station? According to the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, ratified by 98 nations, states have legal jurisdiction within spacecraft registered to them. When the space station was assembled from modules supplied by the United States, Russia, Japan and the European Space Agency (ESA), partners rejected an initial proposal that US law should prevail throughout the space station. "It was agreed that each state registers its own separate elements, which means that you now have a piece of the US annexed to a piece of Europe annexed to a piece of Japan in outer space, legally speaking," said Dr Frans von der Dunk of the International Institute of Air and Space Law at the University of Leiden. So what happens if a crime is committed in space? "If somebody performs an activity which may be considered criminal, it is in the first instance his own country which is able to exercise jurisdiction," Dr. von der Dunk added."
Please mod parent flaim bait :)
I mean, its called Interantional for one reason.
Yeah American are paying .. but I guess they accepted to join , again, an International base.
That would be a pretty stupid thing to do -- the comment presents a reasonable argument. You can disagree but that doesn't suggest a flamebait mod.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
It would be cooler if your domain was registered in Belgium, or if your domain was Calcium, instead.
:)
Then it would either be beryllium.be or calcium.ca
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.