Kazakhstan will send a cosmonaut to the International Space Station a year or so from now, the Kazakh National Space Agency announced.

But funding arrangements for the flight haven’t yet been concluded, according to the RIA Novosti news service in Moscow.

The astronaut selected for the mission will take the place of a would-be space tourist, Russian businessman Vladimir Gruzdev, a member of the ruling United Russia party, whose trip would have been paid for by the party.