A senior NASA official told Reuters yesterday that Russian space officials have told their American counterparts that Moscow wants to continue flying its astronauts to the International Space Station until their orbiter is up and running. station.

In addition to the statements of a senior Russian official released yesterday, the latest figures indicate that Russia has at least six years to end more than two decades of orbital cooperation with the United States.

This comes after newly appointed Director General of the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos) Yuri Borisov surprised NASA by announcing on Tuesday that Moscow intends to withdraw its cooperation with the International Space Station “after 2024”. .”

However, NASA space operations chief Cathy Leaders said in an interview that Russian officials told the US Space Agency on Tuesday that the Russian space agency Roscosmos wants to remain in the partnership while Russia works to operate the its site Planned Orbital Aircraft, named ” Ross ” .

“We have not received any indication at any business level that anything has changed,” he told Reuters yesterday, noting that NASA’s relationship with Roscosmos continues as normal.

The International Space Station is a football-field-sized science lab that orbits 400 kilometers from Earth, and has been operated continuously for more than two decades by a partnership led by the United States and Russia, which also includes Canada, Japan. and 11 European countries.

It is one of the latest displays of cooperation between the United States and Russia, although its fate has been in doubt since the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine in February, which has strained bilateral relations on many fronts, with the administration of US President Joe Biden imposing economic sanctions against Moscow.

The conflict in Ukraine has also strained relations between the Russian Space Agency and the European Space Agency.