Brasília, March 1, 2004 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - The president of the Brazilian Space Agency (AEB), Luiz Bevilacqua, and the director of the National Institute of Space Research (Inpe), Luiz Carlos Moura Miranda, are meeting today in São José dos Campos (SP) with a high level NASA mission headed by NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe. Brazil is the third Latin America country on the schedule of the mission, which has already been in Honduras and Guatemala and will still visit Argentina and El Salvador.

At the meeting the directors of the two institutions, which are linked to the Ministry of Science and Technology, will analyze the current stage of cooperation in space between the two countries and Brazil's participation in the International Space Station, among other topics.

The visit by the NASA delegation to Brazil began yesterday (29) at the headquarters of the National Institute of Research on Amazônia, in Manaus. Cooperation in space between Brazil and the United States has been going on for over 40 years and has become increasingly intense, mainly in the scientific area. The Barreira do Inferno (Hell's Cliff) Launch Center, for example, inaugurated in 1965, received a lot of American support, including equipment, when it began operations.

The delegation headed by O'Keefe is made up of the following members: John Schumacher (Chief of Staff), Paul Pastorek (Legal Consultant), Glenn Mahone (Assistant Administrator for Public Relations), Michael O'Brien (Assistant Administrator for Foreign Relations), and Kate Maliga (Director of Earth Sciences/Foreign Relations). (DAS)