In Heaven as on Earth? The Interaction of Public International Law on the Legal Regulation of Outer Space: 1/2 June 2012, Bonn - Oberkassel

This volume contains the proceedings of a conference that was held on 1/2 June 2012 in Bonn. This conference had as the central subject the question of the relationship of public international law and space law. Although space law as a relatively young discipline has a history of approximately 50 years of law-making, the question of the relationship of this special body of rules to the body of general international law was rarely asked in the past. Therefore, the Institute of Air and Space Law of the University of Cologne together with the German Aerospace Centre, DLR, had invited a number of specialists both from the area of public international law as well as international space law with the aim of raising mutual awareness. An awareness of public international lawyers for the special regulation of certain areas in international space law and, equally important, an awareness of space lawyers for the rules of general international law. We are happy that we can now offer the proceedings of this conference to a wider audience and hope that the conference proceedings meet with wide interest of the readers. For the preparation of the conference as well as for the correction of the manuscripts we are indebted to Ms Kerstin Deiters and Mr Erik Pellander, both from the Institute of Air and Space Law at the University of Cologne.