Iran’s Revolutionary Guards launched a research satellite Saturday, putting it in a higher orbit and marking a new milestone in the country’s aerospace program, which has drawn criticism from the West.
The US has frequently warned Iran against such launches, claiming that the same technology can be utilized for ballistic missiles, particularly those designed to deliver a nuclear payload.
The Islamic Republic claims that its satellite and rocket launches are solely for civil or defensive objectives, and denies any desire to build nuclear weapons capabilities.
“The Soraya satellite of the Iranian Space Organisation… was successfully launched with the Ghaem-100 satellite carrier of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” the official IRNA news agency said.
“This is the first time that Iran has successfully placed a satellite in orbits higher than 500 kilometres (310 miles),” IRNA said.
Telecommunications Minister Issa Zarepour told the news agency that the satellite, which weighs around 50 kilograms (110 pounds), was sent into orbit 750 kilometers above Earth.
The formidable Revolutionary Guards’ aerospace organisation manufactures the Ghaem-100 carrier rocket. It is the country’s first three-stage solid-fuel satellite launch vehicle.
While Tehran has previously had satellite launch mishaps, the successful launch of its first military satellite, Nour-1, into orbit in April 2020, brought a harsh reprimand from the US.
Other Western governments have voiced similar concerns about Iran’s aerospace programme.
Tehran has faced devastating US sanctions since Washington’s withdrawal from a historic nuclear deal in 2018, which provided Iran economic relief in exchange for limits on its nuclear activity, with the goal of preventing it from obtaining a nuclear bomb.