MOSCOW – Russia has decided to leave the International Space Station "after 2024," the newly appointed head of Moscow's space agency announced on Tuesday to President Vladimir Putin.
The announcement comes as the Kremlin and the West are at odds over Moscow's military intervention in Ukraine, as well as several rounds of unprecedented sanctions against Russia.
Russia and the United States have collaborated on the International Space Station (ISS), which has been in orbit since 1998.
"Of course, we will fulfil all of our obligations to our partners, but the decision to leave this station after 2024 has been made," Yury Borisov, Roscosmos's new chief, told Putin in mid-July.
"I think we'll start putting together a Russian orbital station by this time," Borisov added, calling it the space program's main "priority."
"Good," Putin said in a statement released by the Kremlin.
Until now, space exploration was one of the few areas where cooperation between Russia, the US, and its allies had not been hampered by tensions over Ukraine and elsewhere.
He stated that he would seek to "raise the bar, and first and foremost, to provide the Russian economy with the necessary space services," referring to navigation, communication, and data transmission as examples.
Sending the first man into space in 1961 and launching the first satellite four years earlier are among the Soviet space program's key achievements, which remain a source of national pride in Russia.
Experts say the Russian space agency is a shadow of its former self, having suffered a series of setbacks in recent years, including corruption scandals and the loss of a number of satellites and other spacecraft.
Borisov, a former deputy prime minister with military experience, has taken over for Dmitry Rogozin, a fiery nationalist politician known for his bombastic statements and eccentric behaviour.
