Dmitrij Bakanov, head of the Russian state space agency Roskosmos, is visiting the USA this week and has met Sean Duffy, acting head of the US space agency Nasa and also the country's transport minister.
The meeting is the first of its kind in over seven years.
Together, Bakanov and Duffy witnessed the launch on Friday of four astronauts – two Americans, one Japanese and one Russian – to the International Space Station (ISS).
A few years ago, Russia said it would withdraw from the ISS cooperation, where, in addition to the USA, the European Space Agency (ESA) is also included. The space station is also approaching the end of its technical lifespan.
But now they have agreed to extend both the cooperation and the ISS operations somewhat.
We agree to run the ISS until 2028. And we will work on the issue of bringing it down by 2030, says Bakanov according to the regime-loyal Russian news agency Tass.
According to Roskosmos, they also discussed "cooperation on the moon program, joint exploration of outer space and continued cooperation on other space projects".
The contacts have been marked by tensions after Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, but the countries have continued with mixed crews traveling to the ISS with their respective countries' spacecraft.
