In the last three decades since, in 1957, the first Sputnik circled the earth, a significant number of legal rules to govern space applications have been adopted.

In the field of primarily civil space activities, agreements were reached on the following instruments.

(1) The Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and other Celestial Bodies, of 1967.

(2) The Agreement on the Rescue of Astronauts, the Return of Astronauts and the Return of Objects Launched into Outer Space, of 1968.

(3) The Convention on International Liability to Damage Caused by Space Objects, of 1972.

(4) The Convention on Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space, of 1974.

(5) The Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and other Celestial Bodies, of 1979.

On top of these instruments, the UN adopted two sets of Principles, the 1982 Principles Governing Direct Television Broadcasting and the 1986 Principles Relating to Remote Sensing.

The General Assembly of the Organization of American States which met in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, decided by a Resolution dated 9 December 1985, to convene a Fourth Inter-American Specialized Conference on Private International Law (CIDIP-IV), and not only assigned the Permanent Council to undertake all the preparatory work but also urged the Inter-American Institute of the Child (IIC) to continue the examination of matters relating to children that may be included in the Agenda of the forthcoming Conference.

The adoption of the Declaration on the Progressive Development of Principles of Public International Law relating to a New International Economic Order (Seoul Declaration) by the 62nd Conference of the International Law Association (ILA) in 1986 set the seal on eight years of hard work by the ILA's Committee on Legal Aspects of a New International Economic Order (NIEO Committee). However, it certainly did not mark the end of the Committee's efforts.

In the era of glasnost and perestroika, one is confronted almost daily with new developments in European socialist countries, especially in the USSR, Poland and Hungary. Some States, however, have resisted the charm of Mr. Gorbachev and the lure of his policies. Rumania, Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria each have their own reasons to fear the spread of what might reasonably be characterised as ‘socialist realism’ in the most positive sense, viz., an awareness that socialist States must confront the realities of late 20th century Europe in an honest and progressive way.

A high point was reached in the CSCE process with the adoption of the extensive Concluding Document of the third follow-up meeting in Vienna of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE) on 19 January 1989. This document, which is the result of more than two years of negotiation, is remarkable for two reasons. First, the 35 participating countries – all the European States with the exception of Albania, together with Canada and the United States – have never before achieved so much agreement on so many formerly disputed matters relating primarily to human rights as they did in Vienna. In addition, a significant advance was recorded in Vienna on the matter of supervising the performance of the obligations accepted by the CSCE States: the supervisory mechanism of the human dimension of the CSCE signifies at the same time a significant strengthening of the institutional structure of the CSCE process. It is my intention in this article to examine to what extent the Helsinki process, in particular its institutional features, has undergone a change in character as a consequence of the results achieved at the follow-up meeting. At the same time, I shall look at a number of institutional changes and adaptations that I consider to be desirable.