Russia to ban US from using Space Station over Ukraine sanctions
In retaliation
for imposing sanctions, Russia will also bar its rocket engines from launching
US military satellites
From left: Steve Swanson from the US and Alexander Skvortsov and
Oleg Artemyev from Russia before the launch Photo:
Camera Press/Ria Novosti
Reuters
7:56PM
BST 13 May 2014
Russia
is to deny the US future use of the International Space Station beyond 2020 and
will also bar its rocket engines from launching US military satellites as it
hits back at American sanctions imposed over Ukraine crisis.
Russia’s
deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin announced a series of punitive measures on
Tuesday against the US in response to sanctions imposed after Russia annexed
Crimea.
The two
countries have long cooperated closely on space exploration despite their
clashes in foreign policy.
The Space
Station is manned by both American and Russian crew, but the only way to reach
it is by using Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft.
The US
is keen to keep the $100 billion (£600) ISS flying until at least 2024, four
years beyond its original target.
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At a
time when Moscow is struggling to reform its accident-plagued space programme,
Mr Rogozin said US plans to deny export licences for some high-technology items
were a blow to Russian industry. “These sanctions are out of place and
inappropriate,” Mr Rogozin said. “We have enough of our own problems.”
Moscow’s
response would affect NK-33 and RD-180 engines which Russia supplies to the US,
Mr Rogozin said. “We are ready to deliver these engines but on one condition
that they will not be used to launch military satellites,” he said.
RD-180
engines are used to boost Atlas 5 rockets manufactured by United Launch
Alliance, a partnership of Lockheed Martin and Boeing that holds a virtual
monopoly on launching U.S. military satellites.
Mr
Rogozin said Moscow was planning "strategic changes" in its space
industry after 2020 and aims to use money and "intellectual
resources" that now go to the space station for a "a project with
more prospects".
He
suggested Russia could use the station without the United States, saying:
"The Russian segment can exist independently from the American one. The
U.S. one cannot."
The US
space agency NASA is working with companies to develop space taxis with the
goal of restoring US transport to the station by 2017, but the United States
currently pays Russia more than $60 million per person to fly its astronauts
up.
Mr
Rogozin said Russia will suspend the operation of 11 GPS sites on its territory
from June and seek talks with Washington on opening similar sites in the United
States for Russia's own satellite navigation system, Glonass.
He
threatened the permanent closure of the GPS sites in Russia if that is not
agreed by September.
He said
the suspension of the sites would not affect everyday operations of the GPS
system in Russia, where it is used by millions of Russians for navigation on
their smartphones and in their cars.
The
upheaval in Ukraine - where the United States says Russia is backing
separatists and the Kremlin accuses Washington of helping protesters to topple
a Moscow-friendly president in February, has led to the worst East-West crisis
since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.
In
addition to the hi-tech sector sanctions, the US has imposed visa bans and
assets freezes on officials and lawmakers and targeted companies with links to
President Vladimir Putin. The European Union has also imposed sanctions.
The
Russian Foreign Ministry said earlier on Tuesday that the latest EU measures
were an "exhausted, trite approach" that would only deepen discord
and hamper efforts to defuse the crisis in Ukraine.
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