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NASA has its "hands tied" and is forced to cut the International Space Station (ISS) live feed when UFOs turn up, according to a campaigner who has studied alleged alien phenomena for years.

Conspiracy theorists have often claimed the US space agency covers up the existence of extraterrestrial life by terminating the live feed from the ISS at the exact time UFOs appear.

This has never been proven and, according to the message that pops up when the feed is cut, it is simply down to a "temporary loss of signal with the International Space Station".

But Stephen Bassett, who has been relentlessly campaigning since 1996 for the government to declassify its supposed knowledge of aliens, believes NASA's hands are tied.

(Image: NASA)

He told Daily Star Online: “They have been in a really tough spot and I feel for them and so if they are turning off the video cameras because something is flying by the space station it is not NASA being the bad guy.

"It’s them essentially obeying the law, which is what the National Security Act is, and simply not doing anything which would, quote, endanger the truth embargo because under the act of national security it has to remain."

Stephen is the Executive Director of the Paradigm Research Group, an organisation set up to end the supposed government-imposed “truth embargo” on extraterrestrial presence on Earth.

This truth embargo, he explained, is what is stopping information on aliens being released to the public and something that NASA is also the victim of.

"I greatly respect NASA but they are in an impossible position," he continued.

“NASA was formed in 1958 by the Space Act and by then the government was well aware of the extraterrestrial presence but they had to have a civilian space program because the Russians were obviously in space and we had to respond.”

But according to Stephen, the civilian space program had a problem because it was known that it was “very likely” phenomena would be encountered.

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In his exclusive chat with this site, he refused to call them UFOs and instead used the term UAPs (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) in line with the US Navy's recent clarification.

He continued: “And so what the government did, what congress did, was to put a clause in the Space Act right there up the front that says anything which involves national security, deemed to be national security matters, that NASA encounters will be completely turned over and deferred to the Department of Defence and NASA will say and do nothing.

“And so since 1958, NASA has been between a rock and a hard place.

(Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

“They are out there, they probably see things, but they can’t address it, it has to go to the Pentagon, and they have to lie if they are pressed and that’s just it, that’s the law."

Stephen thinks NASA staff would throw parties if the existence of aliens was publicly revealed and which would prompt a goldrush for space research.

He said: “Obviously, ending the truth embargo of disclosure will be a massive boom for NASA, oh my God.

(Image: NASA)

“First of all, the burden of having to maintain this posture, essentially a blind posture, will be gone and the interest in space and space research will expand and explode and NASA will be the recipient of that.

"And so they will be throwing some serious parties at various NASA facilities around the country the day after the head of state finally confirms the ET presence."

Military testimony – such as the USS Nimitz UFO which was spotted by baffled US Navy pilots — is often seen by UFO researchers as credible evidence that the US government has been hiding the existence of extraterrestrials for decades.

A US Navy veteran claimed the strange "tic-tac" UFO appeared to have legs in clearer footage, while a NASA scientist suggested that the purpose of the object was to look for something hidden in the ocean.