UK YouTuber Benjamin Rich quizzed and fined at Russian space centre

Tourists photograph a rocket on a launch pad at Baikonur Cosmodrome in 2015

A British YouTuber was questioned "for a few hours" by police at a Russia-controlled space centre in Kazakhstan on Saturday, he has confirmed.

Benjamin Rich said he was fined £60 for not having the required permission to visit the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

It comes after the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos said Mr Rich had been detained near a launch pad at the site.

Dmitry Rogozin had claimed Mr Rich was being investigated over "illegal acts".

But the vlogger, known for his travel channel Bald and Bankrupt, said in an Instagram post on Sunday: "Basically I was questioned by Russian police for a few hours for going to see the Buran rocket without the special permission and given a £60 administrative fine just like hundreds of foreign adventurers before me."

Mr Rich emphasised it was an administrative offence, "meaning just a fine and told not to do it again just like smoking in the wrong place or jay walking".

Mr Rich's YouTube channel, which he describes as "off the map in former Soviet lands..." has more than 3.5 million subscribers.

All space station flights using Russian rockets are launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, which is open to tourists who apply for permission from Roscosmos.

The launch complex in Kazakhstan, formerly part of the Soviet Union, is where the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched by the USSR in 1957.

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