Riyadh – Saudi Arabia chose its first woman astronaut to go into space, state media has reported. Rayyana Barnawi will join fellow Saudi male astronaut Ali Al-Qarni on a mission to the International Space Station (ISS) during the second quarter of 2023, the official Saudi Press Agency said on Sunday (12). The astronauts “will join the crew of the AX-2 space mission” and the space flight will “launch from the United States,” the agency said.
Saudi leader prince Mohammed bin Salman has been trying to shake off the kingdom’s austere image through a push for reforms. Since his rise to power in 2017, women have been allowed to drive and to travel abroad without a male guardian, and their proportion in the workforce has more than doubled since 2016, from 17% to 37%.
Saudi Arabia’s foray into space is not the first, however. In 1985, Saudi royal prince Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, an air-force pilot, took part in a US-organized space mission, becoming the first Arab Muslim to travel into space. In 2018, the country set up the Saudi Space Authority and last year launched a program to send astronauts into space.
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Translated by Guilherme Miranda
