Madam Speaker, I simply add as a matter of personal pride that I did a good deal of work on the substance of space research, not simply the law, and particularly on international telecommunications satellites. I was involved in the negotiations which were ultimately unsuccessful between Intersputnik and Intelsat.
On this particular issue, law follows the flag, and a spaceship has a nationality, in this case multinationality. There is no problem in principle in applying national law to it in the same way that one applies national law to an aircraft crossing the Atlantic. The ship's flag, the country of nationality of the aircraft applies its criminal law, and also those who have passengers of their own nationality can attach it too. Plurality of jurisdiction is not a problem. It is not novel.