China's Shenzhou VI spacecraft has safely returned to Earth, after five days in orbit.
The craft, carrying two astronauts, landed at 0432 on Monday (2032 GMT on Sunday) in the remote grasslands of Inner Mongolia.

It is the second manned spaceflight for China - only the third country to successfully put a man into space.

China first sent up a manned mission in 2003, following the United States and Russia into space.

The capsule is reported to have landed by parachute only 1km (0.6 miles) from its target.

Beijing has attached great importance to its space programme, viewing it as a source of national pride and international prestige.

China hopes to set up a space station within five years and eventually it wants to put an astronaut on the Moon.

My comment:

Why spend so much money on this?
Aren't there more urgent problems on earth, in science?
It is no secret that the experiments carried out on the ISS for instance did not yield as much as was expected. So why start plans for another white elephant, another piece of rubbish orbiting the earth and turning the sky into a dump?