China National Space Administration
On 26 March 2007, the director of the China National Space Administration, Sun Laiyan, and the head of the Russian Space Agency, Anatoly Perminov, signed a landmark space co-operation accord, entitled the "Cooperative Agreement between the China National Space Administration and the Russian Space Agency on joint Chinese-Russian exploration of Mars". One stipulation of the agreement was the construction and launch of the Yinghuo Mars orbiter and its Russian counterpart, Fobos-Grunt.