Iran is set to launch a new satellite on Sunday, the country’s telecommunications minister announced.
The satellite will be set into orbit to gather geographic imagery and data to analyze earthquakes, natural disasters and agricultural information, Iran says, but the U.S. has warned the launch could be part of Iran’s ballistic missile development.
“Today, you will launch a ’Zafar’ satellite, and the first image to be broadcast by the satellite will be for the martyr the team,” Iran’s Minister of Information and Communications Technology Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi tweeted Sunday.
He said the launch will take place from the Semnan space center in northern Iran at a speed of “7,400 kilometers.”
Iran has successfully launched three satellites since 2009, with two failed attempts last year.
The latest launch comes amid heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran and just over a month after the U.S. killed a top Iranian military commander, which led Iran to launch a missile strike on a U.S. military base in Iraq.
Despite Iran’s repeated claims that it is not developing nuclear warheads, the U.S. has maintained concerns that the long-range ballistic missile technology used to launch the satellites could be part of a longer term effort to launch nuclear weapons.
• Lauren Toms can be reached at lmeier@washingtontimes.com.
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