South Korean astronaut Yi So-yeon and Russian cosmonaut and flight commander Sergey Volkov wave after putting on a space suit, shortly before boarding the spacecraft, at Baikonur cosmodrome April 8, 2008. [Photo: Reuters]

A Russian spaceship with the first South Korean female astronaut along with two Russian cosmonauts on board blasted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Tuesday, mission control located outside Moscow said.

The Soyuz TMA-12 lifted off from the space center on the barren steppes of northern Kazakhstan at 15:16 hrs Moscow time (1116 GMT) and will dock with the International Space Station (ISS) at 17:00 hrs Moscow time (1300 GMT) Thursday.

The crew of the 17th main expedition -- Russian cosmonauts Sergei Volkov and Oleg Kononenko -- are to work aboard the ISS for over half a year. Yi Soo-yeon, South Korea's first female cosmonaut, is to perform a series of scientific experiments while on board the ISS and is to return to earth in ten days' time together with the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko and US astronaut Peggy Whitson, who have been working in orbit since October last year.

Yi will make photographs and videotaping, and talk to her fellow citizens during her 10-day mission.

The 17th space mission's working program includes two space walks. They will receive and unload three Progress spaceships and welcome the crews of the three space shuttles, the first of which, Discovery, is to arrive at the ISS in early June. Aside from that, Volkov and Kononenko will do a major part of the work to unload the first European cargo spaceship of the ATV series, which docked with the ISS on April 3.

The crew of the 17th ISS space mission will conduct 47 scientific experiments in orbit. Some of them will be entirely new. U.S. astronauts -- Garrett Reisman first and then Sandra Magnus, who will come to the ISS on board Discovery -- will help their Russian colleagues with the mission.