title: Supra-Earth affairs.
abstract: The United Nations briefly considered the issue of extra-terrestrial intelligence at the 32nd session of the General Assembly in 1977. As a result, the Office of Outer Space Affairs was tasked to prepare a document on issues related to 'messages to extra-terrestrial civilizations', but this area has not been followed through in more recent times. This discussion paper describes the United Nations' activities in the field of near-Earth objects in some detail, and suggests that this might be used as a model of how Member States could proceed with dealing with this issue in case the existence of extra-terrestrial life/intelligence is established.
authors.affiliation: Office for Outer Space Affairs (OOSA), United Nations Office at Vienna (UNOV), Wagramerstrasse 5, A-1220 Vienna, Austria. mazlan.othman@unoosa.org
authors.forename: Mazlan
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Othman
mesh_terms: D032781:Codes of Ethics; D018534:Earth, Planet; D018559:Exobiology / Q000941:ethics*; D005118:Extraterrestrial Environment; D007360:Intelligence; D038622:Internationality; D057766:Policy; D014480:United Nations / Q000941:ethics / Q000458:organization & administration