Europe's Space Goals

The European Space Agency(ESA) is asking it's 18 member states(17 European countries and Canada) to donate 8.8bn euros for future European space missions.

The money would allow ESA to put the ExoMars lander on the Red Planet by 2011, set up a sattalite to monitor Earth and build Cryosat 2 that would replace an ice-monitoring probe which was lost on launch.

The 17 European contries will meet in Berlin on Monday to dissuss the plans and whether the countires feel its worth contributing the money.