In a rare move, the National Space Development Agency of Japan is requesting court arbitration to settle the bill for the failed launch last November of an H-II rocket, NASDA officials said Sunday.

NASDA filed the request with the Tokyo District Court on Sept. 13 because the Transport Ministry and the Meteorological Agency are refusing to share the cost of the failure, the officials said.

The origin of the intra-governmental squabble is apparently its own rocket contract, which fails to stipulate how costs should be allocated in the case of a rocket failure.