Russia’s new space chief has signaled his country’s intention to withdraw from the International Space Station after 2024, but a senior NASA official said Moscow has not communicated its intention to withdraw from a two-decade partnership with the space station. United States.
“Of course, we will fulfill all our obligations to our partners, but the decision to withdraw from the station after 2024 has been made,” Yuri Borisov, the newly appointed director general of the Russian space agency, told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday .
“Surprised” by this development, the representative of the State Department said in his statements.
But earlier, Robin Gatens, the space station director for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, said her Russian counterparts had not communicated any such intention, as required by the intergovernmental agreement on the station: “Nothing official yet.” Gatens said in an interview at an International Space Station (ISS) conference in Washington. “We literally just saw it too. We haven’t gotten anything official.”
The ISS agreement between the United States and Russia is one of the last links of political cooperation between the two countries, as relations have sunk to a Cold War nadir following Russia’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine.
However, NASA and Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, have discussed extending Russia’s involvement in the space station until 2030, and the White House earlier this year approved NASA’s plans to keep the orbiting laboratory running until then.
Russian space chief Borisov’s remarks followed a pattern similar to that of his predecessor, Dmitry Rogozin, who during his tenure occasionally signaled his intention to retire from the space station, as opposed to formal talks between NASA and Roscosmos .
NASA has seen Russia as vital to keeping the space station operational, and agency officials want to maintain the partnership through 2030, officials previously said.
Earlier this month, Russia and the US agreed to continue sharing astronaut flights to the space station, allowing cosmonauts to fly in US vehicles in exchange for US astronauts flying in Russia’s Soyuz.
Former Russian space chief Rogozin previously said as director general that Russia could not agree to extend his country’s role on the ISS beyond 2024 unless the US lifted sanctions on two Russian companies that had entered the blacklisted for their suspected military ties.
Putin removed Rogozin as space chief on July 15, replacing him with Borisov, a former deputy prime minister and deputy defense minister.
Source: Capital
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