VIENNA, April 12. /TASS/. The majority of agreements in the sphere of space exploration have grown obsolete and need to be updated taking into account an increase in the number of countries involved in space activities, CEO of Russia’s state space corporation Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin said in a joint interview with Director of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) Simonetta Di Pippo.

"There are already a number of international treaties and conventions related to the prohibition of nuclear tests in space, policies for the exploration and use of outer space, the rescue of astronauts, the registration of spacecraft, etc. But it should be noted that most of these agreements were concluded in the 1960-70s, and ought to be updated. The space economy will grow rapidly this decade, the number of participants in space activities will multiply, and we need to improve the system of space law and regulation of space traffic," he said in an interview published by the UNOOSA to mark the 60th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s first spaceflight on Monday.

The head of the Russian space agency emphasized that "there should be no place for segregation in space, so that all countries can benefit equally." "We cannot, and should not, limit the number of members of the space club. And we are ready to provide assistance and, of course, help those who want to engage in space activities for the peaceful development and preservation of the ecological balance on Earth. But the more participants engage in space activities, the more urgent the task of forming a system of space law becomes. The foundations for it have already been laid," he explained

He didn’t exclude that in the future a base on the Moon will be built and people will travel to Mars and back. "Modern engineering advances and technical capabilities may allow us to achieve these goals in the future. <...> There exists no such force in the world which could suppress the passion of mankind to overcome difficulties," he pointed out.

On April 12, the world celebrates Cosmonautics Day. This year, 2021, marks 60 years since Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin’s historic spaceflight. Gagarin who was the first man in space circled the Earth once in his Vostok 1 spacecraft and returned safely, landing in the southeastern part of European Russia.