EU and Russia discuss space research
A high level meeting took place in Brussels, Belgium, on 28 July 1998, in order to specify the tasks of the Space Dialogue, an initiative established to increase cooperation between the EU and Russia in the field of space research. This initiative was agreed by Mrs. Edith Cresson, European Commissioner for research, and Yuri Koptev, Director-General of the Russian Space Agency (RKA) in June 1997, and forms part of the implementation of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA), which entered into force on 1 December 1997. The meeting enabled participants to review existing agreements between Russia and the EU in this area and to define future priorities. In particular, the meeting will focus on environmental services and earth observation, and the proposed creation of a global environmental service. This would encompass a wide range of activities linked to the observation of the earth, sea and the atmosphere, and would be developed within the framework of the Space Dialogue. The final report of a study on the state of space cooperation between the EU and Russia was presented during the meeting. This study, financed under the TACIS programme of the EU, provides an inventory of all recently completed projects and ongoing cooperation activities between the European and Russian space industry, and identifies a number of potential activities in priority sectors. The study reveals that cooperation is already developing substantially and, since 1992, Russia has signed framework agreements on space with most of the Member States of the EU. The Space Dialogue will aim at developing further cooperation projects, and more particularly, during the first phases, those dealing with environmental monitoring and navigation.