BAIKONUR, June 2. ( RIA Novosti) - The Baikonur spaceport continues to play a key role in ensuring Russia's guaranteed access to outer space and its permanent presence there, Russian defense minister Sergei Ivanov stated. The Baikonur space center turns 50 today.
"At present, Baikonur is a powerful scientific-technological complex with a permanently developing experimental-test base. The spaceport is one of the world's most capable ones and continues to play a key role in ensuring Russia's guaranteed access to outer space and its permanent presence there, Ivanov told the press.
Over 50 years of the spaceport's existence, about 2,500 space and intercontinental ballistic missiles have been launched from it, he said.
"A total of 2,5000 space and intercontinental ballistic missiles, over 130 Russian and foreign cosmonauts and about 3,000 military, research and socio-economic spacecraft have been launched from the spaceport over 50 years of its existence" Ivanov said.
Last year, three launches of space and intercontinental ballistic missiles were carried out and 13 spacecraft put into various orbits from Baikonur, he added. Three launches of carrier rockets have been carried out jointly with Roskosmos crews over five months of this year.
The spacecraft of many countries such as Britain, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Malaysia, Germany, USA have been put into the orbit by Russian carrier rockets in the past years.
The flight tests of the prototypes of new rockets, which are being developed in accordance with to the defense ministry's tactical-technical requirements, are going at the Baikonur cosmodrome. Among these are carrier rockets Proton-M, Soyuz-2, the upper-stage rocket-Briz-M, Ivanov said.
