In 1977 France set up a special investigating group (GEPAN) under the auspices of the French National Space Agency (CNES). (GEPAN has published reports of investigations, including an investigation of ground effects (after a UFO was seen to land and take off) which could not be explained. In 1985 the Commission for the Investigation of Anomalous Atmospheric Phenomena was established under the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union with Cosmonaut Pavel Popovich as its director. More recently UFO investigation has been carried out by the SOYUZUFOTSENTR (Unified UFO Center) under the Academy of Sciences. Rather high level contacts have been established between American and Russian investigators in recent years. The Chinese government announced the founding of the Chinese Society of UFO Research as a branch of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in 1980.