Roscosmos may open office in Belarus
MINSK. Nov 27 (Interfax) - Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) head Oleg Ostapenko has called Russian-Belarusian cooperation in space exploration promising and announced Roscosmos' plans to open an office in Belarus.
"The opening of a Roscosmos office is under consideration for giving a boost to our joint work," Ostapenko told reporters in Minsk on Wednesday.
He also said that Russia and Belarus had agreed to set up a working group dealing with joint projects. "It could be a question of laser technologies, an upgraded Earth observation system and the use of the Glonass network," Ostapenko said.
He told Belarusian Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovich about his meetings with his Belarusian partners and their ideas. "Their reports evoked keen interest and we took notice of certain suggestions," Ostapenko said.
The Belarusian prime minister expressed confidence in the success of Russian-Belarusian space cooperation and mutually advantageous research projects.
"Space cooperation was highlighted in the constructive discussion of aspects of Russian-Belarusian cooperation" at the recent meeting with Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Myasnikovich said. "We reached a complete mutual understanding," the prime minister said, singling out two areas. The first area is "the construction of a super-modern high-resolution Earth observation satellite," Myasnikovich said. "We also discussed the possibility of setting up a joint company, which will design satellites," he said.