Iran prepares to launch “at least two satellites” into area by late March, Telecommunications Minister Issa Zarepour mentioned on Sunday, simply over a month after efficiently testing a launcher.
The United States has repeatedly voiced concern that such launches may enhance Iran’s ballistic missile expertise, extending to the potential supply of nuclear warheads.
But Iran insists it’s not looking for nuclear weapons and that its satellite tv for pc and rocket launches are for civil or defence functions solely.
“Nahid 1 and Nahid 2 satellites are being prepared,” Zarepour was quoted as saying by official information company IRNA.
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Nahid is the identify given to a collection of telecommunications satellites developed by the Iranian Space Research Centre.
According to Zarepour, “we will have launches by year’s end,” March 20 within the Persian calendar.
In early November, Iranian state tv introduced the “successful suborbital launch of the satellite launcher named Ghaem-100”.
The Ghaem-100 rocket was manufactured by the aerospace organisation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and it’s the nation’s first three-stage solid-fuel satellite tv for pc launcher, the channel added.
Iran efficiently put its first navy satellite tv for pc into orbit in April 2020, drawing a pointy rebuke from Washington.
In August this yr, one other Iranian satellite tv for pc, named Khayyam, was launched by Russia on a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Iran’s area company mentioned the machine was constructed by Russia below Iran’s supervision.
The US alleged on the time that the Khayyam would allow “significant spying capabilities” and {that a} deepening Russia-Iran alliance amounted to a “profound threat” to the world.
Iran’s area company rejected these allegations, countering that the aim of Khayyam was to “monitor the country’s borders”, and assist with the administration of pure sources and agriculture.
