The cooperation is continuing between the United States and Russia despite the tensions over Ukraine invasion. Mark Vande Hei - the US astronaut who has created a new American record for longest stay in space - will come home on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
The Russian vessel will touch down in Kazakhstan, the BBC reported. Apart from Vande Hei, two Russian astronauts will also be brought back to Earth.
"I can tell you for sure Mark is coming home... We are in communication with our Russian colleagues. There's no fuzz on that," Joel Montalbano, NASA's International Space Station (ISS) programme manager told the BBC.
The top space scientist said the astronauts are aware of what is happening on Earth, but still work as a team.
The development is as per the International Space Law which makes it mandatory for astronauts from all nations to provide “all possible help to astronauts when needed, including emergency landing in a foreign country or at sea”.
The Outer Space Treaty, which established the International Space Law, was signed in 1967. It says that space activities are for the benefit of all nations, and any country is free to explore orbit and beyond. The treaty also clarifies that there is no claim for sovereignty in space; no nation can “own” space, the Moon or any other body.
Vande Hei has already broken the US single spaceflight record of 340 days and is ready to come back home now. The world record of continuous stay of 438 in space belongs to Russia.
The Soyuz capsule carrying Vande Hei, and Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Novitsky and Pyotr Dubrov, docked at the ISS in April last year.
Under the space cooperation, the US controls power and life support aboard the ISS, while Russia controls other things, such as propulsion.
