MOSCOW. Dec 12 (Interfax) - The Russian government has approved negotiations between Roscosmos and the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on signing the third supplement to the agreement on cross-flights to the International Space Station (ISS).
The corresponding government decree was published on the official legal information website on Thursday.
"To accept the proposal of Roscosmos, a Russian state corporation for space activities, agreed with the Russian Foreign Ministry and other federal executive authorities concerned to negotiate the signing of the third supplement to the agreement on the implementation of the agreement between the Roscosmos state corporation for space activities and the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration regarding integrated crew flights on Russian and American manned spacecraft," the document said.
On September 11, Roscosmos head Yury Borisov said that Roscosmos and NASA plan to extend the program of cross flights to the ISS, as this will help maintain the reliability of work aboard the station.
In July 2022, under the ISS program, Roscosmos and NASA signed an agreement on cross-flights by three Russian cosmonauts on U.S. Crew Dragon manned spacecraft and three U.S. astronauts on Russian Soyuz MS manned spacecraft in 2022-2024.
In December 2023, Roscosmos said it extended the cross-flights agreement with NASA until 2025. Roscosmos Executive Director for Manned Space Programs Sergei Krikalev told Interfax the additional agreement envisioned two more joint flights to the ISS before 2025.