The Centre for Public Diplomacy of the Russian Federation has marked Cosmonautics Day, celebrating the legacy of Yuri Gagarin.

Gagarin became the first human to travel into space in 1961.

The Counsellor and Head of the Foreign Policy and Media Section at the Embassy of the Russian Federation, Anton Chirva, said Cosmonautics Day is a global celebration, noting that Gagarin's historic flight paved the way for space exploration and contributed to modern communication technologies worldwide.

"This celebration belongs only to our country. Actually, it was the achievement for the whole humanity. You know that 15 years back when the 50th anniversary of the first man's flight was celebrated, United Nations proclaimed it as the international day of the first flight of a man into the space.(...) So that's why we decided to share this celebration with Namibia and decided to arrange today's event."    

The Director of Russian House in Namibia, Maksim Kloss, hopes Namibian youth will develop skills in engineering and space-related fields to contribute to the country's future development.

"I hope that here as we are now in Namibia, the youth, the young people of namibia will develop their skills in engineering, in space craft, in everything to contribute to the development of your country in this field."