Indonesia is in talks with Russia’s State Space Corporation Roscosmos to send its first domestic astronaut into space, Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin said.
“We have began negotiations with countries akin to Türkiye, Indonesia and Hungary because they wish to launch their very own cosmonaut. They wish to cooperate with Roscosmos,” Rogozin said in an interview for Rossiya 24 television.
Earlier reports indicated that Russia may send Turkish and Hungarian astronauts into space.
In November, a Hungarian delegate to the European Space Agency ministerial meeting said the country was in talks with Roscosmos about the potential for sending its astronaut to the International Space Station by 2024. Soyuz rockets operated by Roscosmos are currently the one solution to transport astronauts to the ISS. The first Hungarian astronaut, Bertalan Farkas, was launched into space aboard Soyuz 36 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in 1980.
Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin met with the Turkish ambassador to Russia in October to debate the prospects for bilateral Russia-Turkey cooperation in space exploration. Rogozin stated that Russia is able to train and launch a Turkish astronaut to the International Space Station (ISS) by 2023.
