Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi says the Islamic Republic is planning to send Tolou (Sunrise) satellite into space from a new satellite launch center.

Addressing a group of space technology researchers in Tehran on Monday, Vahidi stated that Tolou would be launched on Simorgh satellite carrier from the Imam Khomeini Satellite Launch Center.

    The Iranian defense minister stated that the final phases of the center’s construction are underway.

He added that some developed countries have not been able to send satellites into space and only five other countries in the world have had some of the achievements that Iran has made in the field.

On January 28, Iran sent a monkey into space on a suborbital flight and returned it to Earth safely.

The Islamic Republic launched the Kavoshgar Pishgam (Pioneer Discoverer) rocket, which took the primate to an altitude of 120 kilometers.

Iran launched its first domestically manufactured satellite, Omid (Hope), in 2009. The Islamic Republic sent its first bio-capsule containing living creatures into space in February 2010, using the domestically manufactured Kavoshgar-3 (Explorer-3) carrier.

Iran is one of the 24 founding members of the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, which was set up in 1959.

Source: PressTV