On January 9 and 10, space agency leaders from more than 30 countries met in Washington at a conference hosted by the U.S. State Department and the International Academy of Astronautics to discuss deep-space exploration. According to Aviation Week, NASA officials took advantage of the opportunity to meet with their counterparts from China.

Although the two countries work together on the International Space Station, cooperation between US and Chinese space agencies is limited due to national security concerns. The “Chinese exclusion policy” forbids NASA researchers from working directly with Chinese citizens. In 2011, the US congress specifically forbid NASA from using federal funds to host Chinese visitors and in 2013 a number of US researchers boycotted a NASA conference over the decision to ban Chinese nationals from attending.

Space exploration is expensive, and astronauts from many countries have reported that viewing the Earth from space has a tendency to blur international borders. There are many who would like to see the world’s economic and scientific superpowers cooperate more. Among them is NASA administrator Charles Bolden.

“We are looking for ways in time to find different ways we can be a partner to them,” Bolden told Aviation Week “Human spaceflight is not something that’s going to happen with U.S. [and] China in the foreseeable future, because we are forbidden from doing that by law, so let’s just get that out there … That’s not going to change; not today, anyway.”

However it is possible that opposition to cooperation may diminish in time. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), who chairs the House appropriations subcommittee that oversees NASA funding, has been one of the chief opponents of US-China cooperation in space and Wolf has announced that he is not seeking another term in office.

Source: Aviation Week