Anatoly Perminov, head of Roskosmos, the Russian space agency, told the ITAR-TASS news agency Roskosmos is developing projects to send two tourists - one from Japan and the other from a second country - into orbit separately next year and the year after.

He said the countries partnering in the ISS - Brazil, Canada, Japan, Russia, the United States and 11 countries of the European Union - must consent to the visits, however.

Nevertheless, Roskosmos "fully supports space tourism," Perminov stressed.

Perminov said within a few years, there could be many private spacecraft carrying tourists to orbit around Earth, but those spacecraft would be less reliable than the Russian Soyuz, which currently is used to ferry crew and cargo to the space station.

South Korea plans to pick two potential space tourists by next month, with the intention of putting the first Korean into space two years later, according to the South Korean Yonhap news agency.

In October 2007, one of the two candidates will travel to the ISS aboard a Soyuz spacecraft, the agency reported earlier this year.

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