Eight countries – the United States, Great Britain, Italy, Canada, Australia, Japan, the United Arab Emirates and Luxembourg have concluded an international agreement on the moon exploration. The accord also provides for the extraction of minerals there, NASA reports.
Russia and China are not among the countries that signed the document.
The signing ceremony took place online as part of the International Astronaut Congress.
The document on the exploration of the moon was named Artemis Accords – after the American lunar program Artemis.
The United States, which has taken a leadership position, emphasizes that the agreements are based on the provisions of the Outer Space Treaty, which was signed at the initiative of the United States, Great Britain and the USSR in 1967.
The document said that countries are prohibited from establishing sovereignty over any cosmic body or part of it. NASA believes that the old document is vague and difficult to apply, so a new one needs to be concluded.
Now it will be possible to create mining bases and so-called security zones around them in order to prevent conflicts with other countries.
NASA chief James Bridenstine drew an analogy with the world’s oceans and said that countries can own resources, but should not claim the moon itself.
“We think the Moon it’s like the world’s oceans — you can mine ocean resources. But that doesn’t mean you own the ocean. You should be allowed to mine resources on the Moon: you own resources, but you do not own the Moon,” he said.
The Verge notes that the agreement is only a set of principles that countries must follow and not a document that provides for any sanctions for violation of the provisions.
The start of the Artemis lunar program, within which the agreement was signed, was scheduled for the end of 2021. NASA also expects to land astronauts on the moon by 2024.
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