The ministers adopted a five-year programme, which will cost about 8.255 billion euros (9.710 million dollars) and includes an Earth surveillance project that is focused on both security and the environment, they said. The decisions prove "the will and the desire to take Europe further" in space research, an area that has become "strategic", Dutch Economy Minister Laurens Jan Brinkhorst, told the press.

The "European preference" will mean that the 17 member countries of ESA will give priority to launchers developed by the agency, such as the Ariane 5 and its smaller cousin Vega, which is expected to make its first flight at the end of 2007.

Russia's Soyuz launcher is to be used as a medium-sized option when launched from the ESA centre in French Guyana from 2008-2009.

The European Space Agency had been seeking to persuade member states to give preference to Europe-produced launchers, rather than cheaper alternatives in Russia and India, in order to support technology developed on the continent.

European operators will have recourse to non-European satellite launchers only if the price in Europe is more than 25 percent higher than an alternative elsewhere, or if their technical needs cannot be met in Europe, according to the principle accepted by ministers, official said.

"It is going to reinforce the coherence of the ESA member states' policies on satellites. We are increasingly going to develop European standards," ESA director Jean-Jacques Dordain said.

In other measures adopted at the meeting, ministers agreed to continue financing the International Space Station, which faced an uncertain future. The project is to receive 650 million euros (766 million dollars) until 2008, the sources said.

Ministers also agreed to increase their budget payments for space research by 2.5 percent per year until 2010 to take account of inflation. The ESA budget for space research is 500 million euros and is paid for by all member states of ESA.

The ExoMars mission, which is aimed at sending a robot in search of traces of past or present life on Mars in 2011, was given additional funding at the meeting.

"Europe will land on Mars in 2011," Dordain said.

The ministers also gave their backing to a project to prepare for ESA to have a stake in a future inhabitable moon base. They approved a total 724 million euros for this and the ExoMars mission.

The only project that was shelved was ESA's planned participation in the so-called Russian space aircraft project Clipper. Dordain said it was however only a delay and ESA could return to the issue later.

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