India Loses Bid To Host Un Space Conference

Indias bid to host the next international conference on space research and technology under the aegis of the United Nations has been shot down as the global body is trying to cut costs.

After four years of negotiations, governments have finally agreed on holding the conference on space, but have chosen Vienna instead of Bangalore as the venue.

Nandasiri Jasentuliyana, director of the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (OOSA), said the third international space conference, Unispace Three, will be held here between July 19 and 30 in 1999.

India may have been an ideal place to host it (the conference), but we have a moratorium on all conferences that are held outside the major UN offices, a UN official here said. Vienna is the third largest UN office.

 

An Indian official here said India had accepted the moratorium on the conferences outside the UN offices, which was placed as part of the cost-cutting measures within the world organisation.

Developing countries had been insisting that a meet of this nature be held so they can apprise themselves of developments in space technology in the last few years and devise ways to share benefits from advances.

India, being one of the six countries with the capacity to build its own satellites, was a strong contender to host the conference. Bangalore, where the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) is based, was all along a favourite with Geneva and Vienna as potential alternatives.

Indias wish to host the conference was also boosted by the consensus among the G-77 states that the conference be held in a developing country.

The previous two meets were held in Vienna in 1968 and 1982.

However, a major hurdle in Indias way was the attitude of several developed nations which were sceptical about the idea of Unispace Three itself, claiming the demands of developing countries can be met by fully implementing the decisions of the Unispace Two of 1982.

But developing nations argued that a lot had happened in space technology, particularly in the post-Cold War period which heralded a new era of partnership between the United States and Russia.

Developing countries were finally able to convince the UN of the need for Unispace Three, but not the wish to host it in a developing country.

The conference, whose theme will be to analyse the benefits of space research and technology for humanity, is to give particular attention to enhance the use of space-based information and communications technology in the coming century.

It is also to discuss how space technology can be used in the prevention and mitigation of the effects of natural and technological disasters, Jasentuliyana said.