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Occupied Jerusalem: Israel launched an advanced spy satelliteon Monday that will be able to track events in Iran, the country it considers its top foe, even at night and in cloudy weather, defence officials said.
The TECSAR satellite is of particular importance for Israel because it can be used to keep tabs on Iran's nuclear programme, which the US and Israel fear is a cover for pursuing nuclear weapons, they said.
The satellite, developed by Israel Aerospace Industries, operates with a special radar system, allowing it to view much more than existing Ofek satellites that use cameras, the officials said on condition of anonymity.
The satellite was launched from the Sriharikota space station in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.
The launch is another step in the commercialisation of India's 45-year-old space programme, which put an Italian satellite into orbit in April last year for a fee of $11 million (about Dh40 million).
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