The fifth conference of representatives of CIS space authorities began in Moscow on Wednesday, the press service of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) reports.

This time the event is being attended by delegations and officials from Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan, a post on the Roscosmos website reads.

The conference has been held annually in CIS countries starting with 2010. Its main purpose is to discuss topical issues in the multilateral cooperation of CIS countries in the exploration and use of outer space.

"An impetus to multilateral cooperation in the framework of CIS should be given by major space projects and programs such as the development and use of harmonized national systems of land remote sensing, space communication and broadcasting systems, the application of satellite navigation technologies based on GLONASS and other satellite navigation systems, joint peace research, the application of space technologies and results of space operations in different branches of the economy in CIS states," Roscosmos head Oleg Ostapenko said opening the conference.

He expressed confidence that the decisions made at the conference "will promote the expansion and greater effectiveness of the cooperation between CIS member-states in space."

On the first day of the conference speakers raised issues of developing a new legal groundwork for multilateral cooperation, the integration of ground infrastructures using the signal of the GLONASS system, questions of the accession of CIS countries to the International Charter on Space and Major Disasters and questions of developing an interstate system of monitoring disasters from space, the report says.