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The National Space Agency of Ukraine (NSAU) and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) have confirmed their mutual interest in the development of cooperation The National Space Agency of Ukraine (NSAU) and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) have confirmed their mutual interest in the development of cooperation in the sphere of data exchange on remote Earth-sensing, primarily in crisis situations.

The sides discussed their prospective partnership during a working visit of NSAU experts to Germany as part of the Twinning project on strengthening Ukraine-EU cooperation in February.

In particular, they discussed the possible rendering via the Internet of satellite information to the Ukrainian side in crisis situations by the German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD, DLR subdivision), a source told Interfax-Ukraine.

The German side confirmed its interest in receiving information about the Sich-2 earth observation satellite of Ukraine, a launch of which to orbit is planned for this year.

"The conditions of a prospective partnership are at the stage of development," the source said.

As reported, at present the partners are considering the terms for a planned contract to allow the DLR to use Ukraine's Automatic System of Control and Analysis of Space (SKAKO), which operates Ukrainian missile warning systems in Sevastopol and Mukachevo.

One purpose of the planned deal is to use SKAKO to monitor the German TerraSAR-X and TanDEM-X Earth observation satellites, as well as German research satellites, to prevent them colliding with various objects in space, the source said.