Roscosmos wants to initiate talks on anti-satellite weapons test ban.

Roscosmos (the Russian State Corporation for Space) plans to initiate international negotiations on banning in-site verification tests of anti-satellite weapons, Roscosmos Director-General Dmitry Rogozin said during his visit to the TsNIIMash rocket and spacecraft scientific center.

Model of Glonass-M satellite at CeBIT 2011 (Picture source: Bin im Garten)

"Roscosmos plans to initiate international negotiations to seek a ban on carrying out in-site verification tests of anti-satellite weapons by destroying spacecraft and littering low orbits," Rogozin said.

He expressed concern with this type of tests because fragments of destroyed satellites could destroy the International Space Station (ISS).

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a televised address to the Indian nation on March 27 that the Indian Armed Forces had successfully tested their own anti-satellite weapon by shooting down a spacecraft in the low near-Earth orbit. Modi noted that the tests had enabled Indian to join a group of superpowers, including the United States, Russia and China. The interceptor missile created by the Indian Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) was test fired from a range located on Abdul Kalam Island in the Bay of Bengal. The spacecraft, which was shot down, was an Indian satellite.

Later on, Roman Fattakhov, senior assistant to the sub-branch head of the Main Space Intelligence Center, said that more than 100 satellite fragments created in the aftermath of India’s anti-satellite weapons test could pose a threat to the International Space Station in the future.

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