Brussels, 27/01/2003 (Agence Europe) - During a presentation of the Green Book on European Space Policy (see EUROPE 22 January p 13) on Monday in Brussels, the European Commissioner in charge of research Philippe Busquin and Antonio Rodotà, Director General of the European Space Agency largely discussed EU-Russian space co-operation. The press conference followed a workshop jointly organised in Moscow on 23-24 January by the European Commission, ESA and the Russian Aviation and Space Agency Rosaviakosmo. This constitutes the first in an extensive series of objectives for identifying concrete opportunities for the participation of Russian organisations in EU research projects in the fields of satellite navigation (GNSS/GALILEO), global monitoring of the environment and security (GMES), satellite communications, space related life and physical sciences, as well as human and robotic exploration. Mr Rodotà, explained that the human and robotic exploration workshop focused mainly on information exchange systems. In response to questions by journalists, the Director General of ESA, indicated that the issue of using the Soyuz launch pad in Kourou (Guyana) was still on the agenda and that a decision in this respect would be "taken over the next few months". Mr Rodotà explained that the modalities in the transfer of the Baikonour launcher to Kourou are still being explored and that the Russian launcher would "allow for greater flexibility in what the European Space Agency would be able to put forward". As well as the Ariane 5 and Vega launchers, Soyuz is capable of sending satellites weighing 3 tons into orbit and which could in fact fill the void left by the closure of the Ariane 4 programme a few years ago. Mr Rodotà highlighted the fact that co-operation between the EU and Russia did not rule out collaboration with the USA in space research at all but explained, with a nod and a wink, to Moscow that "sometimes choices had to be made".