Portal:Space exploration/Biography/Week 49 2006
Yáng Lìwěi (No image available) (simplified Chinese: 杨利伟; traditional Chinese: 楊利偉) (born June 21, 1965) is a taikonaut of the People's Republic of China. He was the first man sent into outer space by the space program of China, and his mission, Shenzhou 5, made the PRC the third country to independently send people into space.
In a similar move taken by the Soviet Union and the United States (with national space flight heroes Yuri Gagarin and John Glenn, respectively) the official decision to no longer assign him to spaceflight missions was made.