Putin Eyes Russian Amur Region for New Spaceport

The RIA Novosti news agency reports that Russia will be constructing a new spaceport in the Amur Region in the country’s Far East.

The new Vostochny facility would begin hosting unmanned rocket launches in 2015, with human launches to start three years later, the news agency reports. The spaceport would supplement Plesetsk in northwest Russia and the Baikonur Cosmodrome, which the country is now leasing from Kazakhstan.

Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the plans on Thursday. He signed a decree last November authorizing construction of the new facility.