MOSCOW, March 1. /TASS/. Europe’s sanctions cause real losses to Russia’s space corporation Roscosmos. The corporation will estimate them and demand a compensation from partners in Europe, Roscosmos’s press-service told TASS on Tuesday.
"They have caused harm to the Spektr-RG laboratory’s research program by turning off one of the two telescopes. Their sanctions cause real losses to us. The damage will be estimated and a bill presented to the European side," Roscosmos said.
The corporation is uncertain whether international space cooperation involving Russia will continue.
"The answer is to be given by our former partners. Relations with them took years and decades to build. Whenever difficulties occurred, we extended a helping hand, as it was the case with the United States, when its space shuttle program ended, or with Europe, when the US partners abandoned the ExoMars project," Roscosmos said, adding that the Russian side had always demonstrated openness to and readiness for international cooperation.
Earlier, the European space agency said that the chances of launching a Russian-European Mars exploration mission ExoMars were very slim due to the situation in Ukraine. Also, the ESA said it was considering the possibility of using European rockets for orbiting a number of satellites that originally were to be put in space by Russia’s Soyuz rockets.
On Saturday, Roscosmos CEO Dmitry Rogozin said on the YouTube channel Solovyov Live that the German side had sent a notification it was turning off its telescope of the Spektr-RG space laboratory, which is a joint project with Russia.