Russian cosmonauts to perform spacewalk

Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Yury Malenchenko, who are on the International Space Station (ISS), will on Monday perform a spacewalk to carry out a number of maintenance tasks, the Moscow Region-based Mission Control Center reported.

"Padalka and Malenchenko are expected to open the hatches at 18:40 Moscow Time [1440 GMT] and will return to the ISS at 01:05 Moscow Time on August 21 [2105 GMT Monday]," a Mission Control Center spokesman told RIA Novosti.

The cosmonauts will upgrade the space station's exterior and bring inside a number of specimens from a docking module to later send them to Earth for research, the spokesman said.