AKIPRESS.COM - Russia will not abandon the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and will continue launches from it, along with the Vostochny spaceport that is currently under construction in the Amur region, an official of the Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) said on Friday.

“We so far have the contractual obligations, we pay the rent for the land allotted for the space infrastructure. The lease agreement expires in 2050,” the head of the strategic planning and target programmes department of Roscosmos Yuri Makarov told TASS.

Russia has two operating cosmodromes - the northern Plesetsk in the Arkhangelsk region and the southern spaceport Baikonur that is used under lease from Kazakhstan until 2050. Another spaceport - Vostochny - is now under construction and its first priority goal is to ease the burden on Baikonur that currently accounts for 80% of Russia’s space activity. The civilian cosmodrome Vostochny is being built in Russia’s Far East in the Amur region. Its commissioning is planned in 2020.