Russia has said that it is scheduled to launch its first lunar mission for the first in nearly five decades since 1976. The mission has been scheduled in the early hours of Friday on 11th of August which comes as Russia's Ukraine offensive stretches into a second year, sparking huge tensions with the West.

The Russian space agency said that a Soyuz rocket had been assembled at the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Russian Far East for the launch of the Luna-25. "The launch is on August 11," Roscosmos said in a statement. "The Luna-25 will have to practise soft landing, take and analyse soil samples and conduct long-term scientific research," the statement added.

The four-legged lander, which weighs around 800 kilograms, is expected to touch down in the region of the lunar south pole. The launch is the first mission of Moscow's new lunar program and comes as Russia looks to strengthen cooperation in space with China amid ruptured ties with the West after the European Space Agency (ESA) said it would not cooperate with Moscow on the upcoming Luna-25 launch as well as future 26 and 27 missions post its invasion of Ukraine.

Speaking at the Vostochny cosmodrome last year, Putin said the Soviet Union had put the first man into space in 1961 despite total sanctions. He insisted that Moscow would develop its lunar programme despite current Western sanctions.  "We are guided by the ambition of our ancestors to move forward, despite any difficulties and any attempts to prevent us in this movement from the outside," Putin had said at that time.