Virendra Pandit

New Delhi: A week after Russia invaded Ukraine, the conflict echoed in the arena of multinational cooperation in space science when a viral video on Thursday showed Moscow covering the flags of the United States, Japan, and the United Kingdom, who have all announced sanctions, but leaving the Indian flag intact.

“The launchers at Baikonur decided that without the flags of some countries, our rocket would look more beautiful,” Russian space agency ROSCOSMOS’ chief Dmitry Rogozin tweeted.

As the West and its allies imposed phased sanctions against Russia, Rogozin warned these countries of consequences. The crippling sanctions could make Russia pull out of the International Space Station (ISS), leading to its crash into any of the countries opposing Moscow in its military operation in Ukraine.

“If you block cooperation with us, who will save the ISS from an uncontrolled deorbit and fall into the United States or Europe?” he asked. “There is also the option of dropping a 500-tonne structure to India or China. Do you want to threaten them with such a prospect? The ISS does not fly over Russia, so all the risks are yours. Are you ready for them?” he said in a second tweet.

When he asked who would stop the ISS from falling into either the US, Europe, India, or China, American space travel entrepreneur Elon Musk responded, with a single image of SpaceX, that his company would save the ISS from falling on the Earth.

Last year, Musk sent a group of non-astronaut tourists into space and promised that he would take the man to Mars in 2026.

The ISS, an ambitious, multi-national collaborative project, has been in the Earth’s orbit for over 21 years. Launched in 1988, the US, Russia, Japan, Canada, and the European Space Agency (ESA), among others, have collaborated in it.

Astronauts from multiple nations stay on the ISS for specified periods to carry out research missions together. The crew from 15 nations occupy it rotationally for space research. Currently, the ISS is occupied by four NASA astronauts, two Russian cosmonauts, and one from the ESA, the media reported.

Despite the West and its allies announcing sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine, the American agency National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said it would continue cooperation with Russians on operating ISS.