Legal Status of the European Space Agency

by Renáta Dolanská¹ and Vira Halunko^2
1 Greek-Catholic Theological Faculty of the University of Presov (Presov, Slovakia)
² Kherson Faculty Odessa State University of Internal Affairs (Kherson, Ukraine)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29202/asl/2019/3/1
Received: December 26, 2018 / Accepted: February 17, 2019 / Published: April 27, 2019

In the article, the authors reveal that, in accordance with the current international and national legislation of member states, the positive legal status of the European Space Agency (ESA) has been established. The authors emphasize that some factors make the legal status of ESA unprecedented, due to the concept of inviolability of premises, property and correspondence; exemption from all types of taxes, duties and other financial burdens. ESA staff and experts have the same rights as employees of diplomatic institutions. The authors argue that this potential remain unutilized because European private companies and their employees are exempt from it. The article proposes ways to improve the legal status of ESA.

Keywords: Europe, European Space Agency, institution of inviolability, Space, legal status, private space companies

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Dolanská, Renáta and Vira Halunko (2019) Legal Status of the European Space Agency. Advanced Space Law, Volume 3, 5-17. https://doi.org/10.29202/asl/2019/3/1