A summary of a Russian exhibition in Peking, paraphrased from reports in Novosti Kosmonavtiki news №588 and some reports at the Roskosmos site.
Roskosmos, the Russian Space Agency, was part of a larger Russian exhibit in Peking, China, from 6-12 November: “Russia and China: new ways of commercial and economic collaboration in the 21st century.” The Roskosmos chief Anatolii Perminov was there, along with various dignitaries. The Russian space organizations who had displays at the exhibitions were: RKK Energiya (РКК «Энергия» им. С.П.Королева), FGUP GNPRKTs Progress (ФГУП ГНПРКЦ «ЦСКБ-Прогресс»), FGUP NPO Lavochkin (ФГУП НПО им.С.А.Лавочкина), FGUP NPO M.F.Reshetnev Applied Mechanics (ФГУП НПО прикладной механики им. М.Ф.Решетнева), FGUP RNII KP, Jet Propulsion Scientific Research Institute (ФГУП «РНИИ КП»), VNII electromechanics (ВНИИ электромеханики), TsNII Comet Central Scientific Institute (ЦНИИ «Комета»). (Sorry, names of organizations are confusing and I don’t know how to translate them properly – see Russian Institutes & Industry at ESA Permanent Mission in Russia, and R&D Organizations in the Soviet Space Program at Soviet Web Space for some.)
It was the largest Russian exhibition in China in the last 50 years. 2000 people from 46 regions of Russia participated.
On 7/11, A. Permoniov said at a press conference that a Russian-Chinese project on the study of the Moon could be realized in 2010-2011. It assumes that in 2007 the Chinese pilotless apparatus will complete a flight around the Moon, and Russia would actively be connected to the project in the later stage. Provisions would be made for landing apparatus on the Moon, photo-reconnaissance and soil samples. The mission would be launched from China.
The Russian-Chinese collaboration in the region of space during 2007-2009 was affirmed at the exhibition. Chinese ministers spent more than the planned time at the Roskosmos exhibition, apparently pleased by it.
The USA has also made outreaches to China concerning its space program. NASA chief Michael Griffin earlier visited China in September, and a Chinese delegation visited America at NASA’s invitation in Autumn for talks about the possibility of China participating in NASA’s plans for return to the Moon. There was a suggestion that NASA was considering the Chinese Shenzhou ship as an alternative to its crew being transported on Russian Soyuz ships. Nikolai Sevast’yanov, during a videoconference between Moscow and Peking on 10/11, cast doubts on this proposal. Russia is considering increasing Soyuz production so that four ships can fly each year, thus increasing the crew on the ISS. Energiya is also developing a cargo version of the Soyuz spacecraft that would be able to deliver and return to Earth 500 kg of cargo. The Chinese manned program also did not currently include plans for flights to the ISS, and thus far the negotiations of Russia and China about the flight of a Chinese cosmonaut to the ISS were not carried out, Sevast’yanov replied in answer to a journalist’s questions.
The chief of NPO Lavochkin, Georgii Polishchuk, said that there were plans to include a Chinese micro-satellite on the Phobos-Soil, «Фобос-грунт» mission to the Mars moon Phobos, which would deliver a soil sample back to Earth. Ten countries were participating in the mission, planned to launch in October 2009.
The Roskosmos deputy, Yurii Nosenko, stated in the Moscow-Peking videolink that he did not fear that China would surpass Russia in its space program in the near future. They would more likely move in step within the context of their partnership. It also depended upon how the Russian space program continued to develop, for it had been badly retarded in the turmoil of the last 10-15 years. Things had changed somewhat with the adoption of a federal space program. He also said that Russia was opposed to the militarization of space.
