Awwal 25, 1432 / April 29, 2011, SPA -- Russia's national space agency received a new military boss after its former civilian chief left following a series of expensive failures, a local news agency reported, according to dpa. Deputy Defence Minister Vladimir Popovkin has replaced Anatoly Perminov as the head of the Roskosmos, President Vladimir Putin said in a statement reported by the Interfax news agency. Perminov was set to leave Roskosmos upon reaching retirement age of 65, but his removal was accelerated by a series of serious setbacks for the Russian space programme. Popovkin, 53, is an engineer by training and a longtime commander of Russia's space command, the agency responsible for the Kremlin's satellite network. Russia's "proud national tradition" of space exploration and technological innovation will continue under Popovkin's stewardship, Putin said. Roskosmos' most recent failure involved the loss in December of three satellites for a global navigation system. A sensor failure caused the Proton rocket carrying the satellites to crash in the Pacific Ocean, costing Roskosmos some 160 million dollars. Perminov was one of three senior officials reprimanded for the incident. On April 12, Russia celebrated the 50th anniversary of the first manned space flight by cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who remains a national hero across the former Soviet Union. Perminov said soon after anniversary celebrations that Russia was far behind the US in the race to space, with Moscow spending only 3.1 billion dollars a year - a six times less than the money committed by Washington. "We have a confirmed second or third place in all respects," he said. "First place is of course the US. Second and third place are shared between Russia, China and the European Space Agency."
