Rocket bound for international space station fails, crew survives
BAIKONUR,KAZAKHSTAN:A
two-man crew bound for the International Space Station was forced to make an emergency landing when a Soyuz rocket failed shortly after blast-off on Thursday, in a major setback for Russia’s beleaguered space industry.
US astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksey Ovchinin were rescued without injuries in Kazakhstan. The manned spacecraft incident is the first of its kind in Russia’s post-Soviet history.
The Russian space industry has suffered a series of problems in recent years, including the loss of a number of satellites and other spacecraft. “The emergency rescue system worked, the vessel was able to land in Kazakhstan... the crew are alive,” the Russian space agency Roscosmos said in a tweet.
“An accident with the booster, two minutes, 45 seconds,” the voice of Ovchinin could be heard saying calmly in live-streamed footage of the launch from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur cosmodrome. The incident came as the rocket was travelling about 7,563 km, 119 seconds into the voyage, according to NASA. “Shortly after launch, there was an anomaly with the booster and the launch ascent was aborted,” it said. AFP
The International Monetary Fund launched formal bailout talks with Pakistan on Thursday, and IMF managing director Christine Lagarde said she would require “absolute transparency” of Pakistan’s debts, including those owed to China.
She said such disclosures were necessary to determine the debt sustainability of countries seeking IMF loans. The requirements are likely to shine a spotlight on the extent, composition and terms of Pakistan’s debts to China for infrastructure projects as part of Beijing’s massive Belt and Road building programme.
China has pledged some $60 billion in financing to Pakistan for ports, railways and roads, but rising debt levels have caused Islamabad to cut the size of the biggest Belt and Road project by some $2 billion. “In whatever work we do, we need to have a complete understanding and absolute transparency about the nature, size, and terms of the debt that is bearing on a particular country,” Lagarde told a news conference when asked about Pakistan’s debts to China.
The US has criticised China’s infrastructure lending, warning that it has saddled some developing countries with debts that they cannot afford to repay. US secretary of state Mike Pompeo has said there would be “no rationale” for an IMF bailout of Pakistan that pays off Chinese loans.
The United States has become increasingly impatient with what it sees as a lack of support from nuclear-armed Pakistan in quelling a Taliban insurgency that US-led forces are fighting in neighboring Afghanistan.
Lagarde said that the IMF would need to know the extent and composition of the a country’s debt. REUTERS
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