The Russian government announced in a recent statement that Dmitry Rogozin was dismissed from Roscosmos and replaced by Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Yury Borisov. According to a brief statement by the Kremlin, this decision took effect immediately.
The decision to sack Dmitry Rogozin, the director of the Russian space agency, comes just days after he lashed out at the European Space Agency, threatening to limit access to the robot arm aboard the International Space Station. This latest threat from Rogozin was only the last part of a long series of many different threats and controversial decisions he made.
While Rogozin was the leader of the Russian space agency, he had a very turbulent period, and the situation got even worse with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Speaking against the US and European sanctions against Russia with his words supporting the ongoing war, Rogozin also increased his threats to withdraw from the ISS, jeopardizing the long-standing partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA.
Earlier this week, he ordered Russian cosmonauts aboard the Space Station to end work on the new European robot arm attached to the Russian part of the space station. Rogozin accused ESA of “sabotaging” the Mars mission after it officially ended its cooperation with Roscosmos on the ExoMars mission scheduled to launch in September. He also shared a photo on Roscosmos’ official Telegram channel, with three cosmonauts holding the flags of Ukrainian regions supported by Russia.
After this sharing, NASA also made a statement and condemned the ISS’s display of flags and politics on Earth, but generally kept its relations with the Russian space agency diplomatic to maintain cooperation. But even before the war with Ukraine began, Roscosmos under Rogozin made several disparaging allegations against NASA. For example, an unsourced claim made officially by an unnamed Roscosmos official in 2018 said that a NASA astronaut sabotaged the Soyuz spacecraft, resulting in an air leak at the ISS.
However, tensions increased after the start of the war with Ukraine. Rogozin’s support for the war seems to have increased even more after February, when US President Joe Biden said that international sanctions against Russia would also affect the space program. “I really value our professional relationship with NASA, but as a Russian and a Russian citizen, I am utterly unhappy with US policies, which are sometimes openly hostile towards my country,” Rogozin said in a post on Twitter.
Rogozin’s removal from Roscosmos may have been done to prevent further deterioration of relations with NASA and ESA and to maintain peaceful relations, at least in space. However, we do not have any definite information on this issue yet, and only time will tell what stance Yuri Borisov will take.
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