The state commission at the Baikonur cosmodrome has approved the crew of the next expedition to the International Space Station (ISS), the Roscosmos space agency’s press service told TASS on Monday.

"As part of the main crew, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, NASA astronaut Timothy Kopra and European Space Agency’s Timothy Peake were approved," the press service said.

The back-up crew includes Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin, Japanese astronaut Onishi Takuya (Japan Aerospace eXploration Agency - JAXA) and NASA astronaut Kathleen Hallisey Rubins (US).

The carrier rocket Soyuz-FG will launch the Soyuz TMA-19M manned spacecraft at 11:03am on December 15. The spacecraft is planned to dock with the Russia’s Rassvet segment of the ISS at 5:23pm on the same day.

For Malenchenko, the upcoming flight will become the sixth in his career. Kopra has been to the orbit only once before while for Peake the flight will be the first one.

The return of the crew is preliminarily planned for June 5.