Ukraine aims to accelerate space industry development

President Viktor Yanukovych on Friday highlighted progress in Ukraine's aerospace industry in recent years and said his country would continue to develop its space projects. "Our state has made a significant contribution to the development of cosmonautics and continues to cooperate with many countries of the world," Yanukovych said during his meeting with National Space Agency chairman Yuriy Alekseyev and Aerospace Society president Vitaly Zholobov. Ukraine was implementing a number of space projects with Russia and Kazakhstan and was working with Brazil to jointly launch Cyclone-4 rockets from Brazil's Alcantara base. In 2011, Ukraine joined China, the EU, Russia, and the U.S. as one of the top five space rocket-launching countries in the world. Since 1991, Ukraine has grown into a significant player in the space industry, having launched 128 rockets and delivered into orbit 250 satellites for 19 countries. This year, Ukraine has allocated about 322 million U.S. dollars to promote its aerospace industry over the next five years. April 12 is observed in many countries as Space Day and celebrates the first manned space flight by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.