A US State Department official said yesterday that his country and Russia will hold next week the first talks on space security since 2013, but Moscow rejected US and British criticism of its activities in space after testing an anti-satellite weapon, while France officially announced that space has become a strategic field for the activity of its forces Armed.

One of the possible topics for the US-Russian talks, to be held in the Austrian capital, may be clarification "that outer space is not a region without law, or governing rules," US Assistant Secretary of State for International Security Christopher Ford told reporters - in a conference call.

The German news agency DPA quoted Ford as saying that Washington would push Moscow and Beijing to adhere to the standards of how to operate in space, and that it would express concern about China and Russia's efforts to "arm heavily space."

US and Russian officials will meet in Vienna between July 28 and 30 to discuss arms control and space security, which is part of a new exchange of information on space security between the governments of the two countries.

"We hope this meeting will allow us to explore ways to increase stability and security in outer space, as well as promote the issue of developing standards of responsible behavior," said the US Assistant Secretary of State.

Dangerous Activities
Ford described Russia’s activities in space as “strange and dangerous,” and said that Russian and Chinese diplomats “are very creative in coming up with bad ideas about arms control in space.”

An arms race in space https://t.co/r6Uqjr1AZQ#_SMT_ Study Center pic.twitter.com/XebaSYuYSi

- SMT Center for Studies (@SMT_CENTER) May 31, 2020

The Pentagon was accused of testing an anti-satellite weapon on the 15th of this month, and the US Space Command explained that the Russian satellite - known as "Kosmos 2543" - launched mid-this month in an orbit similar to an experiment It was carried out by Moscow in 2017, and the Pentagon then described the object as a high-speed missile.

The Ministry of Defense considered this experiment as further evidence of Russia's ongoing efforts to develop and test space systems that jeopardize the assets of the United States and its allies in space.

The US negotiator on nuclear disarmament, Marshall Billingsley, commented on the Russian experience in space, saying "clearly this is unacceptable," adding that it will be a "major issue" to be discussed next week in Vienna, where talks are taking place on the agreement that will succeed the "New Start" treaty. The treaty covers the nuclear warheads of the United States and Russia, the two superpowers of the Cold War era.

The head of the British Space Directorate Harvey Smith, in a Tweet on Twitter, criticized Russia's activities in space on Thursday, saying that Moscow had launched a projectile with "weapon properties" and called on Russia to act responsibly in space. The British official added that London is concerned that such Russian actions undermine the peaceful use of space, calling on Moscow to refrain from conducting similar experiments in the future.

Russia
yesterday rejected and rejected US and British criticism of its activities in space, and the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that "the tests conducted by the Russian Ministry of Defense on July 15 did not represent a threat to other space objects, and more importantly, they did not violate any of the customs or principles international law".

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it sees the statements made by US and British officials as "an anti-Russian strike within the scope of a targeted media campaign launched by Washington", to tarnish the image of Russia's activities in space.

The ministry in turn accused the United States and Britain of taking steps to develop anti-satellite weapons. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that Russia supports "complete disarmament in space and not placing any kind of weapons in space."

The Russian Defense Ministry said that the "Cosmos 2543" satellite aims to "monitor the status of Russian satellites." However, the daily government newspaper "Rossiyskaya Gazeta" said that the moon has the ability to "obtain information from the satellites of other parties."

The French army
In a related context, the French army added space yesterday, Friday, as a field of new activity for it. The name of the Air Force Chief of Staff has changed to the Air Force and Space Chiefs of Staff, a term that defines new borders for the French forces.

In an interview with the daily "La Provence", French Minister of Armies, Florence Barley, spoke of "crossing from a view of space as a common property in the service of science, to a space within which powers still compete over global hegemony."
However, the French minister stated that Paris "is not in any way involved in an arms race," stressing that her country insists on the peaceful use of space, but stressed that it is her responsibility to ensure that the threats that France is likely to face are identified. France plans to patrol satellites in order to "monitor, diagnose and identify the perpetrators of this category of unfriendly maneuvers." These satellites will be equipped with 360-degree visualization cameras and laser devices to repel and remove those trying to get too close to the French satellites.

A government source told Agence France-Presse last year about developing "sprinklers capable of breaking the solar panels of any satellite trying to get close."

France has set up an annual budget of two billion euros for military and civilian space matters, but it is still far from the top three: 50 billion in the United States, 10 billion in China and 4 billion in Russia.