ESA member states agree to partnership on two ExoMars missions that aim to place an orbiter around the Red Planet in 2016 and land a rover in 2018.

While NASA's Curiosity rover beams back and from Mars, European and Russian space officials are moving to formalize a partnership to get in on the Red Planet action themselves.

Government ministers from the European Space Agency's 20 member states are meeting this week in Naples, Italy for the Ministerial Council 2012, where BBC News reports an agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency has been approved to jointly support unmanned Mars missions in 2016 and 2018.

The ESA said future joint ventures with Roscosmos could include missions to the solar system's largest planet and its satellites, as well as future trips to our own moon.

"We have other opportunities to consider cooperationfor Jupiter missions, for example. ESA has selected Juice, a large mission for Jupiter, and in Russia there is a plan for a Ganymede lander which is of interest to Europe," Frederic Nordlund, the ESA's head of international relations, told BBC News.

"We are initiating discussions to see how we could co-operate on those missions. But this could extend to lunar robotics where we would like to see if we could join forces as well. Russia already has its Luna-Glob and Luna-Resurs missions, which are already being implemented, but we're considering other opportunities for this in other areas," he added.

The U.S. was originally slated to help fund the ESA's two ExoMars missions, which involve placing an orbiting satellite around Mars in a few years time and then landing a surface rover on the planet before the end of the decade, but NASA pulled out in February because another pending project, the future James Webb Space Telescope, has gone drastically over budget.

Following NASA's withdrawal from ExoMars, ESA and Roscosmos officials in March initiated talks towards a partnership that would see the Russians supply heavy-lift Proton rockets for the two missions, as well as additional technology and support for the 2018 rover mission.

Russian space officials required a formal contract for the partnership on the 2016 ExoMars mission, which was scheduled to be signed this month. Roscosmos wants its own instruments to replace NASA's in the trace gas-detecting probe the ESA plans to put in orbit around Mars, as well as joint ownership with the ESA of all scientific results produced by the mission.

The Russians, who would supply a Proton launch vehicle as their payment for inclusion in the first ExoMars venture, aim to outfit the Trace Gas Orbiter with instruments originally launched last November aboard the .