Apr 12 1999
From The Space Library
Celebrating the anniversary of the flight of Yuri A. Gagarin on 12 April 1961, Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin presented state medals to several dozen cosmonauts and space officials during a Cosmonaut's Day ceremony. Yeltsin briefly praised Mir's achievements in his remarks at the Kremlin, but when Director General of the Russian Space Agency Yuri N. Koptev presented him with a model of the new ISS, Yeltsin asked Koptev whether Mir would stay aloft. Koptev responded in the affirmative, but explained during a press conference afterward that private investors had not yet produced funds for Mir's continued operation. Vitaly I. Sevastyanov, a lawmaker and former cosmonaut, called on Russians to contribute money to a charity formed to keep Mir in orbit.
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