Moon Treaty

Moon Treaty

Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies
Ratifications and signatories of the treaty   Parties   Signatories   Non-parties
Signed	December 18, 1979
Location	New York, USA
Effective	July 11, 1984
Condition	5 ratifications
Signatories	11
Parties	16 (as of May 2014)
Depositary	Secretary-General of the United Nations
Languages	English, French, Russian, Spanish, Arabic and Chinese
Moon Treaty at Wikisource

The Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, better known as the Moon Treaty or Moon Agreement, is an international treaty that turns jurisdiction of all celestial bodies (including the orbits around such bodies) over to the international community. Thus, all activities must conform to international law, including the United Nations Charter.

In practice it is a failed treaty because it has not been ratified by any state that engages in self-launched manned space exploration or has plans to do so (e.g. the United States, some member states of the European Space Agency, Russia (former Soviet Union), People's Republic of China, Japan, and India) since its creation in 1979, and thus has a negligible effect on actual spaceflight. As of 2014, it has been ratified by 16 states.

Content

As a follow-on to the Outer Space Treaty, the Moon Treaty intended to establish a regime for the use of the Moon and other celestial bodies similar to the one established for the sea floor in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The treaty would apply to the Moon and to other celestial bodies within the Solar System, other than Earth, including orbits around or other trajectories to or around them.

The treaty makes a declaration that the Moon should be used for the benefit of all states and all peoples of the international community. It also expresses a desire to prevent the Moon from becoming a source of international conflict. To those ends the treaty does the following:

• Bans any military use of celestial bodies, including weapon testing or as military bases.
• Bans all exploration and uses of celestial bodies without the approval or benefit of other states under the common heritage of mankind principle (article 11).
• Requires that the Secretary-General must be notified of all celestial activities (and discoveries developed thanks to those activities).
• Declares all states have an equal right to conduct research on celestial bodies.
• Declares that for any samples obtained during research activities, the state that obtained them must consider making part of it available to all countries/scientific communities for research.
• Bans altering the environment of celestial bodies and requires that states must take measures to prevent accidental contamination.
• Bans any state from claiming sovereignty over any territory of celestial bodies.
• Bans any ownership of any extraterrestrial property by any organization or person, unless that organization is international and governmental.
• Requires all resource extraction and allocation be made by an international regime.

Ratification

Participation in the Moon Treaty

  Parties

  Signatories

  Non-parties

The treaty was finalized in 1979 and entered into force for the ratifying parties in 1984. As of May 2013, 16 states are parties to the treaty, seven of which ratified the agreement and the rest acceded. Four additional states have signed but not ratified the treaty. The L5 Society and others successfully opposed ratification of the treaty by the United States Senate.

The objection to the treaty by the spacefaring nations is held to be the requirement that extracted resources (and the technology used to that end) must be shared with other nations. The similar regime in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea is believed to impede the development of such industries on the seabed.

List of parties

State	Signed	Deposited	Method
Australia		7 Jul 1986	Accession
Austria	21 May 1980	11 Jun 1984	Ratification
Belgium		29 Jun 2004	Accession
Chile	3 Jan 1980	12 Nov 1981	Ratification
Kazakhstan		11 Jan 2001	Accession
Kuwait		28 Apr 2014	Accession
Lebanon		12 Apr 2006	Accession
Mexico		11 Oct 1991	Accession
Morocco	25 Jul 1980	21 Jan 1993	Ratification
Netherlands	27 Jan 1981	17 Feb 1983	Ratification
Pakistan		27 Feb 1986	Accession
Peru	23 Jun 1981	23 Nov 2005	Ratification
Philippines	23 Apr 1980	26 May 1981	Ratification
Saudi Arabia		18 Jul 2012	Accession
Turkey		29 Feb 2012	Accession
Uruguay	1 Jun 1981	9 Nov 1981	Ratification

List of signatories

State	Signed
France	29 Jan 1980
Guatemala	20 Nov 1980
India	18 Jan 1982
Romania	17 Apr 1980

See also

Extraterritorialities Antarctica Embassy Extraterrestrial real estate International waters International seabed Moon Outer Space International zone United Nations See also International organization

• Outer Space Treaty

External links

• Treaty Text — "Agreement Governing The Activities Of States On the Moon And Other Celestial Bodies" (1979)
• Official Treaty Site — United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), including versions of the treaty in several languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish.