years on Editor’s Note: This year marks the 40th anniversary of China’s reform and opening-up policy.

On June 11, 2013, the

Shenzhou X spacecraft, launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gansu province, sent two men and a woman into space.

The report in China Daily featured a photo showing astronauts Wang Yaping, Nie Haisheng and Zhang Xiaoguang (from left to right), meeting the press at the center the day before the launch. They spent 15 days in space.

It was the China’s fifth manned space mission, and the astronauts performed one automatic and one manual docking test with the orbiting space lab module Tiangong 1.

China’s space lab was launched in September 2011.

Space rendezvous and docking are crucial skills for building a space station in the country’s manned space program, which was first approved by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in 1992.

On Oct 15, 2003, China carried out its first manned space mission, sending Yang Liwei on a 21-hour series of Earth orbits in Shenzhou V.

China thus became the third nation after Russia and the United States to achieve that feat. In the 14 years since Yang’s momentous journey, China has evolved from a second-tier player in the global space race into a great power.

This year, in an ambitious schedule, China will conduct at least 40 unmanned space missions.

The country’s first space station is due to be fully operational around 2022 and is set to operate for at least 10 years, according to the China Manned Space Agency.

In 2024, it will likely be the world’s only space station if the US-led International Space Station is retired that year as expected.