SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China re-affirmed its goal of building a
full-fledged space station by 2020 on Sunday, following a
successful manual docking between a manned spacecraft and an
experimental orbiting lab module. "Mastery of rendezvous and
docking technology is a decisive step towards realizing the
goals of the second stage in the development of China's manned
space flight program. It also lays a firm foundation for the
further construction of a space station," said Wu Ping, the
spokesman for China's manned space program at a press conference
following the docking exercise. The Shenzhou 9 and its three-
person crew, including the country's first woman in space, Liu
Yang, separated about 400 meters from the Tiangong (Heavenly
Palace) 1 module for about two minutes before re-connecting
under the manual control of the astronauts, with state
television covering the event live. "It means China has
completely grasped space rendezvous and docking technologies and
the country is fully capable of transporting humans