Roscosmos: 13 countries, including Belarus, will join Russia and China in work over lunar station

Thirteen countries, including Belarus, have joined Russia and China in the work on the creation of an international scientific lunar station – as stated by Roscosmos CEO Dmitry Bakanov, TASS reports

At a recent meeting of the heads of the BRICS space agencies, the Roscosmos CEO said, “Our joint initiative with China to create an international scientific lunar station is actively developing.” According to him, thirteen countries have already joined the project: Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bolivia, Venezuela, Djibouti, Egypt, Nicaragua, Pakistan, Senegal, Serbia, Thailand, South Africa, and Ethiopia, including colleagues from BRICS (Ethiopia, Egypt, South Africa).

Mr. Bakanov explained that unique scientific schools operate in Russia: they are focused on the study of Venus, the Moon, and Mars. According to him, no one in the world has replicated the Russian technology of landing on Venus yet. Russia's technological achievements in the field of deep space exploration can become the basis for international BRICS programmes.

As noted by the Roscosmos CEO, spacecraft from India, the United Arab Emirates, and China have reached Mars, and these countries enjoy the experience of exploring the Moon. Mr. Bakanov hopes the number of such programmes will increase, and their joint implementation will become much more optimal for national budgets and more effective from a scientific point of view.

Mr. Bakanov called for co-operation in the field of training personnel in space and related industries and the development of joint student programmes. He added that more than 85,000 citizens of the BRICS countries currently study at Russian universities, more than half of them have come from China and India.