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Russia is expecting to hold talks with Elon Musk about flying to Mars, President Vladimir Putin’s international cooperation envoy said on Tuesday.
It comes as Russia said it sees significant potential for collaboration with the United States, particularly in space exploration.
Kirill Dmitriev, who was named by Vladimir Putin last month as his special envoy on international economic and investment cooperation, said Russia’s “enemies” were trying to derail President Donald Trump’s efforts to restore dialogue with Russia.
Trump was due to speak with Putin on Tuesday to try to convince the Russian president to accept a ceasefire in his country’s war with Ukraine .
Dmitriev said Russia wanted to work with SpaceX CEO Musk as part of Moscow’s efforts to strengthen and develop Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, and state nuclear corporation, Rosatom.
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“I think that there will undoubtedly be a discussion with Musk (about Mars flights) in the near future,” Dmitriev said at a business forum in Moscow.
He went on to praise Musk’s efforts to push the boundaries of human achievement.
Dmitriev said he was in touch with Roscosmos, Russian business and the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia.
Nasa Administrator Bill Nelson said in October that reported calls between Musk and Putin would be “concerning” to the agency.
The former Florida senator said a Wall Street Journal report describing years of communication should be investigated.
“I don’t know if that story is true,” Nelson said at the time.
“If it’s true there have been multiple conversations with Elon Musk and the president of Russia, then that would be concerning, particularly for NASA and the Department of Defense,” he added. Nelson has also called for an investigation into the report.
A SpaceX spokesperson told The Independent at the time that claims in the Journal were “misleading” and “unsubstantiated.”
Billionaire entrepreneur Musk was among Trump’s biggest donors in the 2024 election and has become one of the president’s closest White House advisers.
Russia said in 2022 it would start work on its own Mars mission after the European Space Agency (ESA) suspended a joint project in the wake of Putin’s decision to send tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine.
