"From a technical standpoint we are working on keeping the station alive at least up to 2025," ESA's director of human spaceflight, Simonetta di Pippo, told AFP on the sidelines of the Paris Air Show.

The International Space Station (ISS) is scheduled to be completed in 2010 after a 12-year assembly effort, leaving only five years before the facility, which has cost tens of billions of dollars, is scheduled to be scrapped.

ESA's director general, Jean-Jacques Dordain, said his agency was "looking for new flight opportunities" to take European astronauts to and from the space station.

Europe has a corps of astronauts but does not have its own transporter to carry them. Until now, the astronauts have been taken aloft either by Russia's Soyuz rocket or the US space shuttle under the ISS contract.

However, those capacities will dwindle after 2010 when the shuttle is to be retired.

Crew transport to and from the ISS will depend entirely on the Soyuz until the United States introduces a rocket-and-capsule system, called Aries-Orion, to succeed the shuttle, which is unlikely to be before 2015.

Dordain said ESA was discussing with Russia and the United States whether they would assign a seat on future missions to a European astronaut.

"I cannot tell you yet what will be the final scenario but we are working on certain tracks.

"We are discussing with not only the United States and Russia but also maybe the other partners, because Japan and Canada, they are like us, they are also missing some flight opportunities and maybe we can combine our efforts to buy an additional three seats," he said.

Dordain was speaking at a press conference where he presented six new members of ESA's astronaut corps.

Unveiled on May 20, the five men and one woman will begin training later this year for a trip to the ISS, although without knowing when they will fly.

The ESA chief insisted, though, that none would be bumped -- a scenario that has been sketched by some observers, given the gap in US transport and Europe's own lack of manned flight ability.

"They will all fly, that is a commitment," he said. "If we have selected six, it's because we are convinced they will all fly.

Di Pippo said that goal would be achieved if the station's life was extended.

"It is clear that if an extension in the lifespan of the station is agreed by partners and member-states of Europe, this will become the reality for them to fly and to fly quite soon... and this will allow them to fly at least once.

"On one side we are talking with the Russians about how we can acquire additional flight opportunities, before and after 2015, and in parallel we are also discussing an agreement with the Americans for our astronauts to be trained on the Orion system," she said.

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