China has sent its first woman into space on a mission to dock with an orbiting station, the latest step in an ambitious programme to go to the moon and on to Mars.

Photo: China's first female astronaut Liu Yang, waves during a sending off ceremony before she departs for the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft rocket launch pad at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Jiuquan, China, Saturday, June 16, 2012. China will send its first woman and two other astronauts into space Saturday to work on a temporary space station for about a week, in a key step toward becoming only the third nation to set up a permanent base in orbit. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

Participants wear traditional clogs as shepherds lead their sheep through the center of Madrid, October 28, 2012. (Photo by Andres Kudacki/Associated Press)

West German police arrest a young man, one of the angry crowd throwing stones at a bus full of Soviet guards making their way to the Soviet War Memorial, 20th August 1962. The crowd were incensed by the death of 18-year-old Peter Fechter, who was shot while trying to cross the Berlin Wall a few days earlier. (Photo by Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

A Black Pete interacts with children during the arrival of Sinterklaas, or Saint Nicholas, in Maassluis, Netherlands, Saturday, November 12, 2016. Sinterklaas and his helper Black Pete are at the center of a long-time controversy because Pete is often played by white people in blackface makeup. (Photo by Peter Dejong/AP Photo)

Medieval jousters Luke Binks (L) and Andrew McKinnon pose for a photograph in Sydney, Australia, August 16, 2017 during a photo call for the World Jousting Championships to take place in Sydney on September 23 and 24. (Photo by Dan Himbrechts/Reuters/AAP)

Ai (R) and Hamuka dressed in “Lolita fashion”, influenced by Victorian style, pose for a photographs at Harajuku shopping district in Tokyo, Japan March 15, 2018. (Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)

Visitors hold ice blocks to cool themselves in hot weather at a water park on June 23, 2016 in Chongqing, China. Citizens and visitors escaped high temperature at a water park in Yangren Jie (also known as Foreigner Street), Nan'an District of south China's Chongqing. (Photo by VCG/VCG via Getty Images)

A man lies in the sea grass at a beach on July 18, 2016 in Qingdao, Shandong Province of China. The enteromorpha prolifera spread on the beaches in Qingdao and were under clearing. (Photo by VCG/VCG via Getty Images)