Paris. September 12. INTERFAX - The European Space Agency (ESA) intends to ask for more than 18 billion euros from its 22 member states to finance programs for the next three years, ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said.
"I am well aware that this is a lot, but it is necessary," Aschbacher said at the World Satellite Business Week conference in Paris. His words are quoted in the European media on Monday.
The ESA will officially make such a request during a ministerial conference at the end of November in Paris.
At the same time, Ashbacher explained that the requested budget, significantly exceeding the previous one, 2019, which was already considered a record - 14.5 billion, will be the subject of negotiations.
"The situation is extremely difficult," the Director General said, pointing to the consequences of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, inflation and the threat of an economic recession in Europe.
According to him, the events in Ukraine showed to what extent Europe depended on Russia, including the space industry, and called the situation "a very painful experience."
The media remind that ESA has abandoned the planned launch from Baikonur in September of the Exomars mission, which was being prepared jointly with Russia, a European rover on a Russian landing platform, in which more than a billion euros were invested. The Agency also found itself deprived of the possibility of launching some of its satellites after the termination of the agreement on the use of the Russian Soyuz launch vehicle.
