NEW LEGAL DIMENSIONS OF THE ORBITAL FREQUENCY MANAGEMENT: CONFLICT OF INTERESTS BETWEEN A GROUP OF ADMINISTRATIONS AND ITS NOTIFYING ADMINISTRATION

摘要

Under the Radio Regulations of the International Telecommunication Union ("ITU"), a single Administration can acton behalf of a group of Administrations when filing frequency assignments of satellite networks and taking further stepswith respect to such assignments. In such cases the Administration that acts on behalf of a group is appointed by thisgroup as this group's Notifying Administration. These provisions are also applicable to a group of Administrationsbeing members of an international intergovernmental organization. Intergovernmental satellite organizations file, viaappointed Notifying Administrations, their own frequency and geostationary orbit resource to be used to implementspace programs and satellite projects. In certain cases international organizations used to request theRadiocommunication Bureau of the ITU ("Bureau") to replace their Notifying Administration. Provisions of theConstitution, Convention or Radio Regulations of the ITU do not rule out that a Notifying Administration acting onbehalf of other Administrations can be replaced, but do not specify how such a change should be handled. In thisconnection any such changes were until recently dealt with by the Radio Regulations Board of the ITU ("RRB") on acase by case basis and no general rule was ever established. The earlier practice of the ITU made it possible to replace aNotifying Administration if requested by an intergovernmental organization provided that both Administrations - theinitial Notifying Administration and the new Notifying Administration - inform the Bureau that the responsibility of theNotifying Administration for all coordination and notification matters has been transferred. In the absence of formalconfirmations, the Bureau was not in a position to change the Notifying Administration as requested by anintergovernmental organization even after a decision had been made to replace the Notifying Administration in strictconformity with the constitutive acts of said intergovernmental organization and considering the viewpoint of theoverwhelming majority of the member states. It goes without saying that this practice never reflected the interests ofgroups of Administrations and had to be changed. The conflict of interests that persisted in 2009 - 2011 between theIntersputnik International Organization of Space Communications ("Intersputnik") and its initial NotifyingAdministration spurred the ITU to come up with a regulatory initiative and led to the approval of an amendment to theRules of Procedure concerning the replacement of an Administration acting as the Notifying Administration on behalfof a group of Administrations within the framework of an intergovernmental satellite telecommunications organization.