Space program signals wider Sino-European ties
News that space experts from Europe and China are to discuss collaboration on a manned "Moon Village" as a launch pad for potential missions to Mars offers a colorful symbol of a wider growing relationship between the two sides.
The talks on the proposed cooperation were first disclosed in April by Tian Yulong, head of the China National Space Administration, and subsequently confirmed by Pal Hvistendahl, a spokesman for the European Space Agency.
The "Moon Village" concept, which the ESA also sees as an opportunity to develop space tourism and lunar mining, is regarded as just one area of potential European-Chinese space cooperation. The Chinese space agency plans to launch a mission to collect samples from the moon by the end of this year and conduct its first mission to the far side of the moon next year. The ESA hopes to take part in analyzing those samples.
