- Strategic advantages for Algiers and Moscow
- The objective is to renew Algeria's satellite fleet and capabilities
Algeria and Russia have just consolidated one of the main areas of activity of their strategic partnership. President Vladimir Putin did so by giving his blessing to the federal law validating the ratification by the Duma of the space agreement signed with veteran Abdelmadjid Tebboune, 79, in power in Algiers since December 2019.
The intergovernmental agreement which comes into force is part of the fruits obtained by President Tebboune, both supreme head of the armed forces and minister of national defense, during his first official visit to Moscow at the end of 2023. Some six months earlier, the director general of the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), Yuri Borisov, had arrived in the country's capital and at the headquarters of the Algerian Space Agency (ASAL) to negotiate the terms of the draft pact.
The framework document defines the legal and organizational structure of the cooperation which will henceforth govern and boost spatial relations between the two nations. It is valid for a period of ten years, automatically renewable for successive periods of five years, unless expressly denounced by one of the parties. One point in the articles states that “goods imported and exported under the agreement are exempt from customs duties and taxes.”
On the side of the Kremlin, the responsibility for ensuring the implementation of the agreement lies with Roscosmos. On the Algerian side, it is under the control of ASAL, the official body created in January 2002 by the late President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to design the national space policy and implement the program of activities aimed at promoting and developing the economy and national security.
Russian-Algerian strategic partnership in the field of dual-use technologies. The Kremlin opened its doors and gave guarantees to the authorities in Algiers to acquire new generation secure communications and spy satellites and put them into orbit from Russian cosmodromes.
Strategic advantages for Algiers and Moscow
Thanks to the facilities obtained in Moscow, the new strongman of the Algerian government, General Saïd Chengriha, “minister delegate to the Minister of National Defense” since November, will soon have two new platforms. Both will be able to match in resolution, or even surpass, the pair of spy satellites that Morocco has in orbit – Mohammed VI-A and VI-B, manufactured by Airbus in France and launched respectively in November 2017 and 2018 – and those it acquired in 2024 from the manufacturer Israel Aerospace Industries (AIA).
Aware of the importance of having their own spacecraft, the interest of President Tebboune and his Prime Minister Nadir Larbaoui, 75, is in the renewal of their aging fleet of satellites with one equipped with more advanced technologies and superior performance to that of Morocco, both in terms of encrypted communications and earth recognition and observation systems.
The two North African dignitaries also managed to include in the agreement that an Algerian citizen will travel into space aboard a manned Russian spacecraft. The document provides for the selection, education and training as cosmonauts of a pair of Algerian military pilots, in the hope that Roscosmos will allow them to fly to the future Russian space station ROS, construction of which will begin in 2027.
Russian-Algerian collaboration in the fields of satellite navigation, new technologies and related information services, as well as science and exploration of outer space, is also planned. In these fields, Algerian researchers are mainly interested in biology and space medicine, where they wish to study the impact of long-duration space missions on human health.
The strengthening of space cooperation between Russia and Algeria represents a turning point for both countries. For the North African nation, it is an opportunity to expand its technological capabilities, train military and civilian technicians in image analysis and strengthen its national sovereignty and technological innovation. For Russia, it helps strengthen its relations with its partners in Africa and the Arab world, while demonstrating that, despite the human, economic and industrial toll of the war in Ukraine, Moscow remains a world leader in the space sector.
The objective is to renew Algeria's satellite fleet and capabilities
Algeria is, with Egypt, one of the pioneer countries to express its interest in putting satellites into orbit and their use in the service of its economic and social development, the monitoring of its oil and gas exploitation and its long borders with Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania, Niger, Mali and the former Spanish Sahara.
The Algerian political authorities are aware of the importance of developing the national space sector and ASAL has a national program covering the period 2020-2040. For four years, the Agency has been considering the short-term launch of at least two new satellites: the high-resolution remote sensing satellites AlSat-3A and 3B and the secure government communications satellite AlcomSat-2, which are expected to be acquired from the Russian space industry.
They will take over from the four satellites that ASAL maintains in service: two Earth observation satellites – AlSat-2A and 2B, weighing just over 100 kilos, manufactured by Airbus Space Systems and launched in 2010 and 2016 respectively. – a secure communications satellite – AlcomSat-1, a 5-tonne platform acquired from China and launched in December 2017 – and a demonstration satellite of nanotechnologies, Alsat-1N, weighing 4 kilos and resulting from a collaboration with the British Space Agency.
President Tebboune and the Director General of ASAL, the famous remote sensing specialist Azzedine Oussedik, are very active in seeking collaboration from other nations in different aspects of space science and technology. The two men take advantage of the visit of heads of state or prime ministers of third countries to seal cooperation agreements in the field of outer space.
The most recent case took place in early December, during the official visit to Algeria by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. His presence in Algiers allowed the director of ASAL and his counterpart from the South African Space Agency (SANSA), Humbulani Mudau, to sign a space cooperation agreement in the presence of the respective presidents.
Scenes with similar results were repeated on other occasions. For example, during the visit of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in November 2023, who arrived in Algeria accompanied by the President of the Turkish Space Agency, Yusuf Kiraç. It was the same during the visit of the Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, who arrived in January of the same year with the president of the Italian Space Agency (ASI) at the time, Giorgio Saccoccia, to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Treaty of Friendship and Good Neighborhood between the two countries.
