Proceedings of the Workshop - United Nations Office for Outer ...

EXPANDING GLOBAL REMOTE SENSING SERVICES 127where the developments are more and moredetermined by market forces. The improved awarenessabout potential and prospects as well as reduction ingovernmental controls is paving the way for multipleplayers including private agencies operating satellitesystems for earth observation The dualism betweenstrategic co-operation and competition is becoming theorder of the day and the evolution of a new set ofrelationships among different players - Government,Industry, User agencies and International organizations- have already begun, leading to a vibrant commercialremote sensing market.It is in this context that the legal aspects ofexpanding global remote sensing services need to beexamined. Various aspects discussed in the paper onPrinciples clearly demonstrate the need to transmit theterms o f the Principles into a treaty. But, whileadapting to the current environment, it is essential thatvarious associated aspects need to be carefullydiscussed and concluded by the internationalcommunity, even though these Principles have sustainedthe pressures and provided the framework at a criticaland evolutionary stage.On the issue of openness and data access, thequestion is one of determining the limits andboundaries o f information access and control. Whilethe complex dynamics of politics, economies andtechnology interacting with the Law may affect theprogress in this regard, the decisive factors are going tobe the application potential and their ramifications in agiven political environment. As the technologicaladvances are bound to enable extraction of critical andstrategically important information from satellite data,the dual power of information, either destructive orconstructive, is going to influence the decision making,more or less analogous to the current state of dual usetechnologies, but much easier to decide on access or'shutter control' in view of the transparency inapplication potential and prevailing politicalenvironment.In a fast changing technological scenario, neither theheritage nor the origin of an innovation should mattermuch. In other words, the military heritage of earthobservation technology has only helped in makingcertain technological 'leapfrogs' possible in thebeginning and 'convergence' later on, in some cases. Itmay not be the lineage, but the resultant technologicaladvancement and hence the information on content thatbrought certain restrictions on data access. As theemerging post-cold war contribution of 'militaryinformationalcomplex' analogous to the 'militaryindustrycomplex' of the cold war is going to putopenness principle at risk, the efforts of theinternational community have to be focused on arrivingat a framework to ensure the availability of data forpeaceful applications, in spite of such doctrines as thato f 'space control'.Establishing and maintaining long-term, coherentregional and global remote sensing data archivesarises as one o f the good suggestions to meet thepeaceful application needs, particularly of thedeveloping countries. The technological advances incommunication and information as well as in otherassociated sectors makes it possible to have easy accessand dissemination of data from these archives.Summary ReportThree fundamental Considerations by the PrimaryAuthor Prof. Joanne Gabrynowicz were examined,namely:1) U.N. Principles have acquired the force of law.COPUOS ought to consider transmitting its terms intoa treaty.2) Increasing access restrictions (shutter control) areweakening the openness principle upon which much ofremote sensing law is based.3) Establishing and maintaining long-term, coherentregional remote sensing data archives.The Commentators Dr. Carlos H. RebellonBetancourt, Mr. Alexander V. Yakovenko, and Dr.M.G. Chandresakhar underlined the necessity to clarifythe legal situation by transmitting the Principles of