Tag: United Nations

International Coalition Aims to Get Answers About UFOs

Article by Christina Stock                                             May 26, 2021                                                  (rdrnews.com)

• On May 25th, UFO researcher and author Donald Schmitt was at the International UFO Museum and Research Center in Roswell, New Mexico to announce the start of a 27-nation (so far) coalition on extraterrestrial research called the ‘International Coalition on Extraterrestrial Research’, or ‘ICER’. The goals of ICER include establishing ‘awareness programs’ in all countries, to pressure governments such as the United States to disclose what they know, and “to prepare for confirmation that Earth has been engaging with non-human intelligences”.

• “Eventually, we will be 50 countries and then we’ll. No more talk, let’s do it,” says Schmitt. “Russia, China, Japan, [countries] throughout South America, throughout Europe, all are coming together. It’s never happened before and as far as it goes, we’re really going to push.”

• Schmitt is an expert on the 1947 UFO crash in Roswell, and has dedicated his life to solving the mysteries surrounding UFO’s. He returns each year for lectures during Roswell’s UFO Festival. He will be a guest speaker at the UFO Museum’s 2021 Ufologist Invasion, July 1-4, which takes place during the UFO Festival and MainStreet Roswell’s Alien Fest.

• ICER is a ‘not-for-profit’ organization comprised of scientists, academics and leading UFO researchers on five continents who are unanimous in their recognition that “we are not alone in the cosmos. Based on more than 75 years of research, ICER acknowledges that the UFO phenomenon is real; it acts with intelligence and is likely to be extraterrestrial/non-human in origin.” Among the researchers in the organization are astrophysicist and former deputy director of sciences at the Bulgarian Space Research Institute Professor Lachezar Filipov of Bulgaria, and astronomer Eamonn Ansbro of the Republic of Ireland, who is currently the director of Kingsland Observatory and SETI in Kingsland, Ireland.

• Schmitt said that many scientists and researchers are skeptical of the US military’s recent release of documents and leaked UFO videos. Of the thousands of pages of documents released, “Nothing is in there or (it’s) redacted, blacked out. It’s so frustrating for us,” he said. Scientists and researchers in other countries are facing the same difficulty finding answers from their governments and militaries. That’s why they’ve united to form the new organization.

• While there is no direct government involvement in ICER, the organization is recognized by the United Nations, “which means then that we can present at the UN,” Schmitt said. “We are going above individual governments.” Schmitt anticipates that the organization will grow. “I am the North American representative, and we had meetings in China, and then we met in Moscow. We put this all together. I had dinner in Moscow with two of the cosmonauts — we are getting people in pretty high places.”

 

                     Donald Schmitt

Tourists visiting the International UFO Museum and Research Center on May 25 were

the International UFO Museum and Research Center in Roswell, New Mexico

greeted by the sight of a television crew interviewing renowned UFO researcher and author Donald Schmitt.

Schmitt, an expert on the alleged 1947 UFO crash on a ranch near Corona, has dedicated his life to solving the mysteries surrounding unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP). He returns each year for lectures during Roswell’s UFO Festival.

Now, he’s joined with scientists and other researchers who have formed a new organization — the International Coalition on Extraterrestrial Research, or ICER — dedicated to finding the answers about UFOs.

“We just announced today (May 25) the start of an international coalition, 27 countries, an international coalition on

             Professor Lachezar Filipov

extraterrestrial research,” Schmitt said. “Russia, China, Japan, throughout South America, throughout Europe, all are coming

                           UFO Museum

together. It’s never happened before and as far as it goes, we’re really going to push.”

Schmitt said that many scientists and researchers are skeptical of the U.S. military’s recent release of documents and of confirmations of cases of UAPs in leaked videos.

The thousands of pages of documents released, he said, don’t hold any details. “Nothing is in there or (it’s) redacted, blacked out. It’s so frustrating for us,” he said.

                       Eamonn Ansbro

Scientists and researchers in other countries are facing the same difficulty finding answers from their governments and militaries, he said. That’s what’s led them to unite and form the new organization.

Asked if any governments are involved, Schmitt said that wasn’t the case. “But we will be eventually recognized by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), which means then that we can present at the UN,” he said. “We are going above individual governments.”

Schmitt said that he is sure the organization will grow. “I am the North American representative, and we had meetings in China, and then we met in Moscow. We put this all together. I had dinner in Moscow with two of the cosmonauts — we are getting people in pretty high places,” he said.

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What Should We Do if Extraterrestrials Show Up?

Article by Avi Loeb                                             April 15, 2021                                             (scientificamerican.com)

• Earth has been broadcasting radio waves into space for over a century, announcing our presence to any other technological civilizations within a hundred light-years that might monitor their sky with radio telescopes similar to ours. Our saving grace might be that these extraterrestrials may use chemical rockets, similar to our own, which would take them a million years to traverse that hundred light years to our doorstep.

• If extraterrestrials did arrive at our doorstep, how should we respond? There is no United Nations international protocol outlining what to do. Is it premature to contemplate a global policy long before it is required? How much advance warning will we have? Any alien spacecraft would at least reflect sunlight which we could detect from earth-based telescopes such as the Pan-STARRS observatory in Hawaii.

• The first interstellar visitor discovered by Pan-STARRS observatory was on October 19, 2017. It was named ‘Oumuamua’ or “scout” in the Hawaiian language. The object showed many anomalous properties that made it different from any natural comet or asteroid that we had witnessed before in the solar system, allowing for the possibility that it could be a product of alien technology, as the article’s author, Avi Loeb (pictured above), discusses in his new book, Extraterrestrial. The likelihood that the object was a probe intended to spy on us is small because Oumuamua more than 10,000 years to traverse the solar system to get here. We have only been transmitting radio signals for over a hundred years.

• Even if ‘Oumuamua’ is an artificial craft, it is ancient and likely too old to be functional. But we can learn a great deal from inspecting and photographing such relics, whether tumbling through our galaxy or resting on the surface of the Moon or Mars where such unusual objects may have collected over billions of years. The lack of an atmosphere or geological activity would make the moon’s surface, in particular, like a museum of extraterrestrial equipment.

• We should keep our eyes open and searching through our telescopes for unusual objects, taking precaution about a vessel possibly masquerading as a Trojan Horse. There might be many small, fast-moving objects traveling through the solar system or other anomalies that we fail to recognize given the limited sensitivity of our telescopes. We could search for them in data streams generated by the Large Survey of Space and Time (LSST) on the Vera C. Rubin observatory.

• Gravitational waves were discovered by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) only after the National Science Foundation (NSF) invested $1.1 billion into it. Similarly, we should expect to find extraordinary evidence for ETs only after we invest major funds in a search. Taxpayer funding would be appropriate given the major impact that such discoveries would have on society—far exceeding the implication of discovering gravitational waves.

• Putting our hands on a piece of alien technology would change the way we perceive our place in the universe, our aspirations for space and our philosophical and theological beliefs. Or we could choose to stay ignorant about our neighbors until they show up. The possible existence of ETs will not go away if we ignore them, just like the Earth continued to move around the sun after religious authorities refused to look through Galileo’s telescope. The dinosaurs dominated the planet until the giant Chicxulub rock showed up in the sky 66 million years ago. We need to be watchful for the next ‘earth shattering’ encounter.

 

     Avi Loeb peering through a telescope

When you’re in an unexplored wilderness, you’d better be quiet, because you never

      Galileo peering through a telescope

know whether there might be dangerous predators lurking.

Unfortunately, Earth has not been following this cautionary principle so far: we’ve been broadcasting radio waves into space for more than a century. If there are technological civilizations within a hundred light-years that monitor their sky with radio telescopes similar to ours, then they may already know about our existence. We could hear from them in the future. Our saving grace might be that chemical rockets, similar to those used in the Voyager or New Horizons missions, would take a million

                          Oumuamua

years to traverse that hundred light years. And so, we might be out for prolonged suspense before encountering our cosmic neighbors.
If extraterrestrials eventually arrive at our doorstep, the question is: how should we respond? Clearly, interstellar affairs are not an imminent policy concern for any nation at this moment, so there is no international protocol issued by the United

  Pan-STARRS observatory in Hawaii

Nations for what to do. We should keep in mind that within a million years, humans might reside on the moon, Mars or free-floating space platforms, and each community might choose to respond differently. It is premature to contemplate a global policy long before it is required.

       Vera C. Rubin observatory in Chile

How much advance warning will we have? That depends on the size of the vehicle used by the ETs. Even without generating artificial light, any alien spacecraft would reflect sunlight. The Pan-STARRS observatory in Hawaii can detect reflected sunlight from objects bigger than a few hundred feet, the scale of a football field, that pass within the orbit of the Earth around the sun.The first interstellar visitor of such size was discovered by this telescope on October 19, 2017, and named ‘Oumuamua—“scout” in the Hawaiian language. The object showed many anomalous properties that made it different from any natural comet or asteroid that we had witnessed before in the solar system, allowing for the possibility that it is a product of alien technology, as discussed in my new book, Extraterrestrial.

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Russia and China Trying to Tie America’s Hands in Space

Article by Bradley Bowman and Jared Thompson                                     March 31, 2021                                      (foreignpolicy.com)

• China and Russia have sprinted to develop and deploy both ground-based and space-based weapons targeting satellites while simultaneously pushing the United States to sign a treaty banning such weapons. Washington should avoid being drawn into international treaties on space that China and Russia have no intention of honoring.

• The Treaty on the ‘Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and of the Threat or Use of Force Against Outer Space Objects’ (PPWT), which Beijing and Moscow have submitted at the United Nations, is a perfect example. PPWT signatories commit “not to place any weapons in outer space.” It also says parties to the treaty may not “resort to the threat or use of force against outer space objects” or engage in activities “inconsistent” with the purpose of the treaty.

• More than two years ago, the US Defense Intelligence Agency noted that both China and Russia were already developing space capabilities that could be used as weapons. The reality is that China and Russia are already racing to field anti-satellite weapons. “The space domain is competitive, congested, and contested,” said the head of US Space Command General James Dickinson. “Our competitors, most notably China and Russia, have militarized this domain.” The PPWT treaty would thus protect their weapons while tying Washington’s hands.

• China’s People’s Liberation Army units are already training with ground-based anti-satellite missiles capable of destroying satellites in geosynchronous Earth orbit, where America’s most sensitive nuclear communication and missile defense satellites orbit. China has also tested several ‘scavenger satellites’ which can sidle up to other satellites and use grappling arms to capture the other satellite.

• In 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin heralded a ground-based laser weapon designed to attack satellites. Last December, Moscow tested a ground-based anti-satellite weapon that could destroy satellites in orbit. Russia recently deployed a pair of “nesting doll” satellites where one Russian satellite actually ‘births’ another. The second satellite has the capability to fire what appears to be a space torpedo.

• Meanwhile, China and Russia are pushing the United Nations for a “no first placement” resolution in which no government should be the first to put weapons in space. In a thinly veiled attempt to mask their intentions, China and Russia claim that their on-orbit capabilities are simply for peaceful purposes — for assessing the condition of broken satellites and conducting repairs as needed. This “dual-use” disguise permits Beijing and Moscow to put into orbit ostensibly peaceful or commercial capabilities that can also be used to disable or destroy U.S. military and intelligence satellites.

• A typical space treaty clearly defines acceptable and unacceptable actions in space and includes inspection and verification mechanisms. But the PPWT treaty does not explicitly prohibit the ground-based anti-satellite weapons that China and Russia have already fielded. Nor does the proposed treaty prevent the deployment of space-based weapons under the cloak of civilian or commercial capabilities. The PPWT does not even prohibit the development, testing, or stockpiling of weapons on Earth that could be quickly put into orbit. Instead, the treaty calls for “transparency and confidence-building measures” implemented on a “voluntary basis.” In other words, Beijing and Moscow want the United States to trust but never verify.

• Moscow habitually seeks to use international arms control treaties to constrain the United States, while viewing treaty strictures as optional when they become inconvenient or when the Kremlin sees an opportunity to seize a military advantage. For more than a decade, Moscow used the ‘Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty’ to constrain the United States while the Kremlin produced, flight-tested, and fielded a ground-launched intermediate-range cruise missile in direct contravention of the treaty.

• Beijing usually avoids any type of international arms control treaties. The willingness of the Chinese Communist Party to support the PPWT is, therefore, cause for some additional reflection.

• Instead of falling prey to China and Russia’s PPWT trap, the United States must work with allies to improve the resilience and redundancy of spaced-based military and intelligence capabilities. “There are really no norms of behavior in space,” said General John Raymond, chief of space operations at US Space Force. “It’s the wild, wild West.”

• In December, the U.N. General Assembly passed a British-introduced resolution that seeks to establish “norms, rules and principles of responsible behaviors” in space, which could reduce the chances for dangerous miscalculation. The vote was 164 in favor, 12 opposed. Those opposing this resolution included China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, and Cuba.

 

               General John Raymond

Saying one thing and doing the opposite is, unfortunately, common in international

             General James Dickinson

diplomacy. Beijing and Moscow, however, seem to have a unique proclivity for the practice.

Consider the actions of the United States’ two great-power adversaries when it comes to anti-satellite weapons. China and Russia have sprinted to develop and deploy both ground-based and space-based weapons targeting satellites while simultaneously pushing the United States to sign a treaty banning such weapons.

To protect its vital space-based military capabilities—including communications, intelligence, and missile defense satellites—and effectively deter authoritarian aggression, Washington should avoid being drawn into suspect international treaties on space that China and Russia have no intention of honoring.

The Treaty on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and of the Threat or Use of Force Against Outer Space Objects (PPWT), which Beijing and Moscow have submitted at the United Nations, is a perfect example. PPWT signatories commit “not to place any weapons in outer space.” It also says parties to the treaty may not “resort to the threat or use of force against outer space objects” or engage in activities “inconsistent” with the purpose of the treaty.

China’s PLA training with anti-satellite weapon

On the surface, that sounds innocuous. Who, after all, wants an arms race in space?

The reality, however, is that China and Russia are already racing to field anti-satellite weapons and have been for quite some time. “The space domain is competitive, congested, and contested,” Gen. James Dickinson, the head of U.S. Space Command, said in January. “Our competitors, most notably China and Russia, have militarized this domain.”

Beijing already has an operational ground-based anti-satellite missile capability. People’s Liberation Army units are training with the missiles, and the U.S. Defense Department believes Beijing “probably intends to pursue additional [anti-satellite] weapons capable of destroying satellites up to geosynchronous Earth orbit.” That is where America’s most sensitive nuclear communication and missile defense satellites orbit and keep watch.

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New Paper Reveals How UK is Making Plans for War in Space

Article by Kit Klarenberg                                        March 25, 2021                                       (rt.com)

• In 1997, the US Space Command’s ‘Vision for 2020’ forecast that space power would evolve into a “medium of warfare” during “the early portion of the 21st century”. Washington being able to “control” and “dominate” space in order to “deny other nations access”, was considered a top priority. Barack Obama escalated deployments of ‘first-strike’ missile defense systems encircling Russia and China in range to strike ground stations that communicate with orbiting military satellites. In March 2018, Donald Trump broached the creation of a ‘Space Force’, and in August 2018 the US’s 2019 National Defense Authorization Act repeatedly referenced “space warfighting operations” and plans to create a “unified command for space” under US Strategic Command.

• Now the UK wants to get in on the action. On March 22, the UK government published its ‘Defence Command Paper 2021’, outlining London’s grand vision for its “role in the world over the next decade” in respect of military and intelligence capabilities and operations. “Space, and our assured access to it, is fundamental to military operations,” the paper reads. “We must develop military, civilian and commercial capabilities that are resilient to and protected from space threats. We must also help shape an international environment of behaviours and operating norms that deters adversaries.”

• By 2030, the UK intends to have “the ability to monitor, protect and defend” its interests “in and through space”. Over the next 10 years, a total of £5 billion will be invested in Skynet, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) network of military communications satellites, which supports the Five Eyes global spying apparatus. £1.4 billion will be spent establishing a dedicated space command, launch a National Space Operations Centre, develop an “intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance satellite constellation”, and create a “Space Academy” to train Britain’s new army of “space specialists”.

• In May 2020, then-MoD Permanent Secretary Sir Stephen Lovegrove told a parliamentary committee that space was “now recognized as a warfighting domain.” The Defence Command Paper states that UK military and intelligence capabilities will from now on be fully integrated across “space, cyberspace, maritime, land and air”. By August of 2020, Royal Air Force officers began training at the US Space Command’s Space Defense Operations Center in California.

• Defence Secretary Ben Wallace consistently frames UK space-combat capacity as inherently defensive in nature. But in April 2019, a mysterious aircraft crash-landed in the West Australian outback. It was revealed to be a state-of-the-art experimental solar-powered surveillance drone, produced by aerospace firm Airbus for the MoD. The craft has a 25m wingspan and is capable of flying unmanned at a height of over 65,000 feet – twice the altitude of a commercial airliner, at the very edge of space.

• China and Russia have repeatedly presented draft treaties to the United Nations calling for a ban on the deployment of conventional weapons in space, and a prohibition on the use of force in and from space and against spacecraft. Despite being supported by an overwhelming number of UN member states, the proposals were consistently rebuffed by Washington.

• The UK’s updated defense priorities are Britain’s own contribution to this determined push to transform space into a dangerous battleground. By Ben Wallace’s own admission, there is “limited international agreement on norms and conventions” relating to the regulation of space technology, combined with “a lack of ethical standards to encourage their responsible use”. A cynic might suggest that, in fact, Whitehall intends to exploit these regulatory and moral shortfalls to its own advantage.

 

Space battles are the stuff of science fiction, but recent technological and political

 Defence Secretary Ben Wallace

developments have done much to make the prospect an ever more likely reality – and it’s clear the UK wants to get in on the action.

On March 22, the UK government published its Defence Command Paper 2021, a 76-page document offering further clarity on the previous week’s Integrated Review, which outlined London’s grand vision for its “role in the world over the next decade” in respect of military and intelligence capabilities and operations.

                  Sir Stephen Lovegrove

An accompanying foreword authored by Defence Secretary Ben Wallace – former British Army soldier and director of military technology firm QinetiQ, who has previously condoned torture – spells out the paper’s disturbing dimensions in some detail.

Strikingly, it contained dozens of references to space in a military context. The heavens were said to be of growing significance as an operational and “warfighting” domain – a dedicated section describing Whitehall’s plans to secure dominance in the sphere.

“Space, and our assured access to it, is fundamental to military operations. Loss of, or disruption to, the space domain could severely impact our ability to undertake most defence tasks,” it read. “We must develop military, civilian and commercial capabilities that are resilient to and protected from space threats. We must also help shape an international environment of behaviours and operating norms that deters adversaries.”

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President Reagan Attempted to Warn the World About Alien Species

Article by Sean Martin                         April 28, 2020                        (express.co.uk)

• Ronald Reagan (pictured above), President of the United States from 1981 to 1989, attempted to warn the public about the existence of aliens by asking the United Nations to imagine ‘how quickly humanity would come together if it was confronted by an extraterrestrial civilization’. (see excerpt from UN speech below)

• In one speech to the UN, President Reagan said: “What if all of us in the world were threatened by an outer power, from outer space, from another planet?” “We would all of a sudden find out that we didn’t have any differences at all.” In another speech, Reagan said, “Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond.” “I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world.”

• While most people saw this as an attempt to defuse simmering tensions between the US and the then Soviet Union, conspiracy enthusiast Scott C Waring believes President Reagan was trying to subtly warn the public of aliens “against national security”. “Of course,” blogs Waring, “President Reagan had inside information from the CIA and NASA and was told that aliens do exist. …But he couldn’t just come out and say so.”

• Waring says that a small percentage of the other nations’ presidents at the United Nations meeting also knew about the existence of aliens. “Now pondering about world peace is nice, but I feel that President Reagan felt a weight on his shoulders, a burden of carrying this knowledge of the existence of aliens.” “It must have been very frightening for him to know that aliens existed, but to have so few people he could sit down and talk about this subject openly.”

• [Editor’s Note]   See Dr Michael Salla’s 2015 article on Reagan linking an ‘alien threat’ to a Secret UN Interstellar Space Fleet. 

 

Ronald Reagan, who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989, attempted to warn the public about the existence of aliens, according to a new claim. During the decades-long Cold War between Russia and the US, President Reagan attempted to calm the tension between the two powerhouses by stating there is not much difference between them.

In doing so, the president asked the United Nations to imagine how quickly humanity would come together if it was confronted by an extraterrestrial civilisation.

In one speech to the UN, President Reagan said: “What if all of us in the world were threatened by an outer power, from outer space, from another planet.
“We would all of a sudden find out that we didn’t have any differences at all.”

In another, he said: “Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond.

“I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world.”

While most people saw this as an attempt to defuse simmering tensions between the US and the then Soviet Union, one person believes President Reagan was trying to subtly warn the public of aliens.

42-second excerpt from Reagan speech to the UN about an “alien threat” (‘kritzingerx24’ YouTube)

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Trump Directs DOD to Establish a Space Force in a Surprise Announcement

by Rachel Becker                 Jun 18, 2018                 (theverge.com)

• On June 18th, President Trump hijacked the scheduled signing of a Space Policy Directive on the subject of space traffic management and space debris at a meeting of the National Space Council to again call for a Space Force as a sixth branch of the US military. “We are going to have the Air Force and we’re going to have the Space Force, separate but equal. It is going to be something so important,” President Trump announced.

• Trump first proposed the idea of a Space Force in March 2018, in opposition to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ who favors a ‘Space Corps’ as an arm of the U.S. Air Force. Mattis argues that it will create more overhead and bureaucracy. The Air Force Space Command currently controls our military interests in space. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 has already directed the DoD to prepare a report on establishing a USAF ‘Space Corps’ that is due in August.

• What Trump didn’t mention was what the Space Force would do and how it would be funded. Point in fact, Congress would have to pass legislation to both to create a new branch of the military and to fund it.

• Then there is the 1967 United Nations’ “Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies”, ratified by 104 nations including Russia, China and the U.S., which prohibits nuclear weapons, war exercises, or even military installations in space. (see Article IV)

• [Editor’s Note] This seems to illustrate the current struggle between the Pentagon/Trump Alliance forces and the historically and predominantly ‘Deep State’ controlled Air Force for official control over space, and therefore disclosure of such secret space programs and technology. Recall that in discussing the USAF space program that shot down the Deep State guided missile over Hawaii in January of this year, Dr Michael Salla distinguishes this hero USAF faction as a “USAF run Secret Space Program that has broken away from Deep State control”.

 

President Donald Trump directed the Department of Defense and the Pentagon to establish a Space Force as the sixth branch of the Armed Forces in a meeting with the National Space Council today.

“We are going to have the Air Force and we’re going to have the Space Force, separate but equal. It is going to be something so important,” President Trump said.

“Separate but equal” is an appalling turn of phrase given that it’s derived from Plessy v. Ferguson, the now-overturned Supreme Court precedent for segregation.

The announcement came as a surprise in a meeting where the newly revived National Space Council was set to unveil the first comprehensive policy on space traffic management. “The whole point of today’s meeting was not about this at all, it was about the space traffic management policy decision,” says Brian Weeden, director of program planning for the Secure World Foundation — an NGO that focuses on space policy.

Still, this isn’t the first time we’ve heard about Trump’s hopes for a Space Force; he first proposed the idea of a Space Force in March 2018 — contradicting Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ opposition to creating a new military service. In a letter to the Committee on Armed Services, Mattis argued that it would just create more overhead and bureaucracy.

As it stands, the Air Force is largely in charge of controlling national security in space under the umbrella of the Air Force Space Command. Its responsibilities include supervising launches and controlling DoD satellites — including ones involved in missile early warnings, communication, and navigation.

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Asgardia, The World’s First ‘Space Nation’, Takes Flight

by Andrea Lo        (www.cnn.com)

• On November 12th, Russian scientist Dr Igor Ashurbeyli included a foot-long satellite within a NASA resupply rocket to the ISS, containing 0.5 TB of data including family photographs, digital representations of the flag, coat of arms, and constitution for the 18,000 citizens of “Asgardia”, to be subsequently released into Earth’s orbit.

• Thus, Asgardia is the world’s first independent nation to operate in outer space.
• The “nanosat” satellite containing the Asgardia data will remain in orbit for between five and eighteen months, the typical lifespan of this type of satellite, before it burns out and disappears.

• Asgardia’s mission is to provide a “peaceful society”, to offer easier access to space technologies, and to protect Earth from space threats such as asteroids and man-made space debris. The Asgardian team hopes to create habitable platforms in low-Earth orbit.

• Asgardia is free to join. Anyone over 18 years old, with an email address, regardless of gender, nationality, race, religion, or financial standing can apply for citizenship.
• Today, there are 114,000 Asgardians from 204 countries.

• Dr Igor Ashurbeyli is a 53-year-old rocket scientist from Moscow who promoted and single-handedly bankrolled the Asgardia project.

• Asgardia’s administrative center will be in Vienna. They plan to elect a government in March 2018 and will ask to be recognized by the United Nations. To achieve this, the UN’s Security Council must first approve Asgardia’s application to be considered a nation, then two-thirds of members of the General Assembly must vote for its admission.

• The plan is to send the first permanent human inhabitants to an orbiting Asgardia by 2026.

 

The world’s first “space nation” has taken flight.

On November 12, Asgardia cemented its presence in outer space by launching the Asgardia-1 satellite.

The “nanosat” — it is roughly the size of a loaf of bread — undertook a two-day journey from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, the United States, to the International Space Station (ISS).

It contains 0.5 TB of data belonging to 18,000 of Asgardia’s citizens, such as family photographs, as well as digital representations of the space nation’s flag, coat of arms and constitution.

Russian scientist Dr Igor Ashurbeyli founded the world’s first independent nation to operate in outer space in October 2016.

Named after a Norse mythological city of the skies, Asgardia is free to join and so far, about 114,000 people have signed up.

Ashurbeyli says the project’s mission is to provide a “peaceful society”, offer easier access to space technologies, and protect Earth from space threats, such as asteroids and man-made debris in space.

While Asgardia’s citizens will — for the time being — remain based on earth, the satellite launch brings the nation one step closer to space.

The satellite’s mission

Asgardia-1 made its journey to the ISS aboard the OA-8 Antares-Cygnus, a NASA commercial cargo vehicle.

Now it must wait for about three weeks as vital supplies and scientific equipment are transferred from the NASA ship to the six people currently living at the ISS.

The nanosat will then be detached from the NASA vehicle and begin its own orbital journey around the earth. Citizens’ data will remain in orbit for between five and 18 months, the typical lifespan of this type of satellite. It will then burn out and disappear.

For Ashurbeyli, the launch fulfills a pledge he made when establishing the “space nation” to take its citizens to space via their data.

“I promised there would be a launch,” he says. “We selected NASA as a reliable partner … because we have to meet the commitments that I made 13 months ago.”

Getting it off the ground

Within 40 hours of the project being announced in 2016, over 100,000 people had applied for citizenship on Asgardia’s website. After three weeks, Asgardia had 500,000 applicants.

Anyone over 18 years old, with an email address, regardless of gender, nationality, race, religion, and financial standing can apply for citizenship — including ex-convicts, provided they are clear of charges at the time of application.

Today, there are 114,000 Asgardians from 204 countries — a population drop from 211,000 in June, when voting to determine the details of Asgardia’s constitution began.

Only those who agreed to adopt the finalized constitution are counted as Asgardians.

Turkey currently has the largest number of Asgardians, with over 16,500 residents.

Rayven Sin, an artist based in Hong Kong, told CNN that she signed up to become an Asgardian in November 2016 after hearing about it on a Chinese radio show while she was in Toronto.

“I really want to be able to see if human beings are able to have more opportunity to express their opinions,” she told CNN. “The society we live in now — everything seems to be either capitalism or communism — there’s a lot of conflict.

“As a human being, I would hope (to see) if we could have other ways (of living). For a better life, and for more options.”

John Spiro, a digital marketing specialist who organizes a monthly meet-up for Hong Kong-based Asgardians, told CNN it was the possibility of sending personal data into space that excited him.

“I help translate and preserve Buddhist sutras as a hobby and the symbolism of sending one of those religious texts in electronic form ‘up to the heavens’ seemed very nice.”

Out of this world idea

Going forward, the Asgardia team hopes to create habitable platforms in low-earth orbits — the first one located 100 to 200 miles (161 to 321 kilometers) from space, which is also where the ISS is located.

The first human flight to this location is projected to take place in eight years’ time.

“We want to give equal opportunities to everyone who has a mind, who can do something, for their protection,” Ashurbeyli said.

“Our real home is not the house or the city where we were born. (Our) home is planet Earth, (and) we want to protect it.

“(It’s) not a fantasy. Going to Mars, the galactics, so on — that’s just fake. I intend something more real.”

Further satellite launches are in the works but no dates have yet been confirmed.

Dr Igor Ashurbeyli

Rocket scientist

A 53-year-old rocket scientist, Ashurbeyli says he is single-handedly bankrolling the project — for a sum that’s undisclosed.

Regularly reported to be a billionaire — although he has never appeared on the Forbes rich lists — the Azerbaijan-born Russian graduated from the Azerbaijan State Oil Academy in 1985, and three years later founded Socium, a software and consulting firm turned holding company with over 10,000 employees, according to his website.

After moving to Moscow in the 1990s, he became a heavyweight in the science industry and, in 2010, was awarded the Russian State Science and Technology Prize. Three years later, he founded the Aerospace International Research Center (AIRC) in Vienna, and today he is chairman of UNESCO’s Science of Space committee.

In short, Ashurbeyli is no beginner when it comes to space.

He did, however, resign from all governmental organizations in 2011, according to his website, and now claims to be politically neutral.

At a press conference in Hong Kong in June 2017, Ashurbeyli explained that Asgardia is a project he has been dreaming of since childhood.

“I was interested in doing something unusual that nobody else was doing,” Ashurbeyli told CNN. “It was my dream to create an independent country.”

That ambition became more concrete after Ashurbeyli gave a speech at a conference on space law at McGill University in Montreal in 2016, where he was inspired by a discussion about the laws governing murder, marriage and divorce in space.

“I thought: ‘Why not organize a country?’ Not only for lawyers. But for technicians, for engineers, for every human … because he’s currently restricted by the laws of the country he was born in.”
Currently space law is adhered to in the form of the Outer Space Treaty, signed by 103 countries including the US and Russia.

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Mystery behind initial report of UN Liaison for Extraterrestrial First Contact

Michael E. Salla, Ph.D.

Kavli Royal Society International Centre. Venue of Oct 4-5 conference: "Towards a scientific and societal agenda on extra-terrestrial life." Photo: Royal Society
Kavli Royal Society International Centre. Venue of Oct 4-5 conference: "Towards a scientific and societal agenda on extra-terrestrial life." Photo: Royal Society

On Sept 26, I reported on a breaking story that at an upcoming Royal Society conference, the head of the United Nations Office of Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), Dr Mazlan Othman, was to reveal how the UN was preparing to appoint her to be the First Contact liaison with extraterrestrial life. The story was first reported by Jonathan Leake, the Science Editor for The Sunday Times, and was picked up my multiple international mainstream media sources including the Sunday Telegraph and The Australian. The Guardian newspaper was eventually able to get in touch by email with Othman to confirm Leake’s story and she replied: “It sounds really cool but I have to deny it.” In addition to Othman’s email, when business opened on Monday, Fox News was able to get in touch with Jamshid Gaziyev, a UN spokesperson who described the story as “nonsense.” The question that remains to be answered is why did the Science Editor of a major British newspaper write about the UN appointing a First Contact liaison with extraterrestrials if there was no substance to it?

First let’s begin with what Leake wrote in his September 26 story, “If Mars attacks, she’s our leader“:

… the UN is set to select an obscure Malaysian astrophysicist who is head of its little-known Office for Outer Space Affairs (Unoosa). Mazlan Othman will describe her potential new role next week at a scientific conference at the Royal Society’s Kavli conference centre in Buckinghamshire.

The conference Leake is referring to is titled: “Towards a scientific and societal agenda on extra-terrestrial life” scheduled to take place on October 4-5. The conference webpage says: “With a mix of invited talks and panel debates, we particularly look into the detection of life, the communication with potential extra-terrestrial civilizations, the implications for the future of humanity, and the political processes that are required.” This is what Leake went on to say about what Othman was set to announce at the conference:

She will tell delegates that the recent discovery of hundreds of planets around other stars has made the detection of extraterrestrial life more likely than ever before – and that means the UN must be ready to co-ordinate humanity’s response to any “first contact”.

What was the basis for Leake’s comments about Othman’s upcoming talk? This is what he wrote:

The Sunday Times has obtained a recording of a talk Othman gave recently to fellow scientists in which she said: “The continued search for extraterrestrial communication, by several entities, sustains the hope that some day humankind will receive signals from extraterrestrials. When we do, we should have in place a coordinated response that takes into account all the sensitivities related to the subject. The UN is a ready-made mechanism for such co-ordination.”

From the recorded talk, it’s safe to conclude that Othman believes that the UN ought to “have in place a coordinated response” to the discovery of extraterrestrial life. Leake goes on to write:

As director of Unoosa, she has developed policies on issues raised by advances in space technology, such as how humanity should respond to the discovery of asteroids and comets found to be on a collision course with Earth. The same thinking lies behind her proposals for dealing with the discovery of alien life.

So what proposals is Leake referring to here? He doesn’t explain what these are and how he learned of them, but he nevertheless elaborates on what the UN is planning.

Her plans to make her department the co-ordinating body for dealing with alien encounters will be debated by UN scientific advisory committees and should eventually reach the body’s general assembly.

In contrast, according to Gaziyev, the UN spokesperson, Othman’s forthcoming conference presentation would: “discuss the problems posed by “space debris mitigation, near-Earth objects (asteroids) and the coordination mechanism for the use of space technology in the United Nations system.” That’s surprising given the theme of the conference and the panel Othman was set to appear on: “Extra-terrestrial life and arising political issues for the UN agenda.” It is sensible given the alleged recorded talk by Othman that Leake said the Sunday Times has and he cited, that Othman is at the very least interested in the UN having “in place a coordinated response” to the discovery of extraterrestrial life. Is the UN playing damage control on what Othman was likely to discuss at a Royal Society conference addressing exo-political issues confronting the UN with the inevitable discovery of extraterrestrial life?

Of course, we know now that a UN spokesperson dismissed the First Contact ET liaison story as nonsense, as did Othman. So the question is why did Leake publish a story that both Mazlan Othman and the UN would quickly repudiate? Why did he write about Othman’s “proposals for dealing with the discovery of alien life” and her “plans to make her department the co-ordinating body for dealing with alien encounters.” Did he infer, fabricate or was he tipped off concerning these “proposals” and “plans”? Was he acting alone or was he acting on behalf of others in preempting or sabotaging what Othman was planning to say at the upcoming Royal Society conference? There is a lot of mystery behind Leake’s initial report given his very responsible position as the Science Editor for a major UK newspaper.

Whatever the answer to the above questions and unsolved mystery behind Leake’s initial report, one thing is clear, leading scientists from around the world will travel next week to the Royal Society to discuss the political and social consequences of the discovery of extraterrestrial life. Most importantly, Othman will be there to provide insight into the role of the UN in coordinating international responses to the issues being discussed. Perhaps she’ll focus on space rocks hitting the Earth as the UN spokesperson said. Or perhaps she’ll open up and discuss the UN having “in place a coordinated response” to the discovery of extraterrestrial life as Leake suggested. We’ll find out shortly. While the conference is now filled,, I’ve been informed by organizers that sessions will be digitally recorded for audio and video release through the Royal Society website.

Further Reading

United Nations to appoint official for First Contact with extraterrestrial life

Princeton University astrobiology certificate explores potential for extraterrestrial life

Galaxy is rich in small Earth-like planets

Stephen Hawking launches exopolitics debate

Is 2010 the year of discovery for extraterrestrial life

Princeton University astrobiology certificate explores potential for extraterrestrial life

© Copyright 2010. Michael E. Salla. Exopolitics.org
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