In a statement, Roscosmos noted that the first missions to explore Venus were carried out by the Soviet Union.

“The enormous gap between the Soviet Union and its competitors in the investigation of Venus contributed to the fact that the United States called Venus a Soviet planet,” Roscosmos said.

The Russians claim to have extensive material that suggests that some objects on the Venusian surface have changed places or could be alive, although these are hypotheses that have yet to be confirmed.

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Russia has announced an intention to independently explore Venus a day after scientists said there was a gas that could be present in the planet’s clouds due to single-cell microbes.

The head of Russia’s space corporation Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, told reporters that they would initiate a national project as “we believe that Venus is a Russian planet,” according to the TASS news agency.