KOROLYOV, Moscow region. April 14 (Interfax-AVN) - Vitaly Lopota, the president of the Energia space rocket corporation, said he believes space tourism is a forced measure compensating for insufficient financing of the Russian space program.
"Tourism is a forced activity. I am sorry, but we have built the ISS [the International Space Station] not for space tourists but for serving the needs of the people of Earth," Lopota said.
Alexei Krasnov, the head of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos)'s manned flight programs, said the ISS crew will be increased to six by 2009.
"There are plans to manufacture four Soyuz spacecraft in 2009 to launch crews to the ISS," he said.
If the Russian space program was financed in full, Russia would not need to make money on space tourism, Krasnov said. "If we lack money, we will have to launch space tourists," he said.
The Energia corporation can build the fifth spacecraft in 2009 to give other countries the chance "to make their dream come true and launch their citizens to space," he said.