Three Chinese astronauts on Thursday entered the country's new space station after their spaceship successfully docked with it, just over seven hours after the launch from the Gobi Desert, in a major milestone for the Communist giant's space exploration plans and its bid to become a leading space power.

According to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA), Shenzhou-12 manned spaceship successfully docked with the space station core module Tianhe on Thursday afternoon and entered the orbital capsule from the return capsule of the spaceship.