China Has All It Takes To Put First Astronauts In Space On Its Own

China has all it takes to put its first astronauts in space from a Chinese cosmodrome in four years to come. This is seen from the success of the launches of Chinese unmanned spaceships in the last two years, the RIA Novosti correspondent quotes General Peter Klimuk, chief of the Cosmonaut Training Center, as saying. Klimuk said that, during his visit to a Chinese space center near Beijing last summer, he saw with his own eyes that Chinese specialists had built an up-to-date training center for astronauts. Klimuk voiced confidence that, after Russia and the United States, China will be the third country in the world independently to make manned space flights. As regards cooperation between Russia and China in space research, Klimuk said that Russia has passed to China several projects with a proposal for joint work on them. Now these projects are being considered. "There are also proposals on preflight cosmonaut training and service of manned spacecraft", said Klimuk. Several years ago Chinese astronauts underwent preparation in the Star City near Moscow. "All this can provide a good basis for further cooperation between Russia and China in the exploration of space", believes Peter Klimuk.