Japan sent into space late Saturday its domestically produced H-2A rocket which separated 40 minutes later with a satellite meant to replace Japan's defunct weather-predicting spacecraft and help navigate air traffic.

"We must win the world's confidence in Japanese space development. Japan is a country that must earn its bread with its scientific technologies," Nariaki Nakayama, minister of science and technology, said after the launch.

"With this success ... we have a foundation on which we can argue for a bigger budget for space development," he said.

The H-2A rocket took off through overcast skies at Tanegashima Space Center in southern Kagoshima prefecture after being delayed twice: once due to bad weather and then due to a communication problem with ground control.

"I am truly happy. The success is a result of lessons learned from the previous failure. I want to offer my sincere respect to those who worked hard on this," Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said.

The weather functions of the 16.3 billion-yen (155 million-dollar) satellite will become operational in May, while aviation officials are expected to start using the satellite by the end of this year, said Masafumi Yasutomi, vice minister of land, transport and infrastructure.

"Our initial assessment shows that the satellite is headed to its orbit as planned," said Tsukasa Mito, executive director of the space agency.

Japan has sent up five H-2A rockets successfully before. But its sixth attempt flopped miserably in November 2003 when a rocket carrying a spy satellite to monitor Stalinist North Korea had to be destroyed 10 minutes after liftoff when one of two rocket boosters failed to separate.

Adding insult to injury, just one month earlier China, Japan's neighbor and growing rival, had become the third country after the United States and the former Soviet Union to put a person in space.

Japanese space officials admitted they still felt trauma and serious stress after losing face 15 months ago.

"After the failure, the confidence of the public was shaken. The confidence of the international community (in Japan's program) was shaken," Nakayama said.

"Another failure was not going to be forgiven," he said. "After seeing the latest launch, I was relieved."

Keiji Tachikawa, president of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, said researchers had been analyzing and inspecting the H-2A since the flop.

"I was confident about this one," said Tachikawa, the former president of top Japanese mobile phone carrier NTT DoCoMo who was brought in after the disaster.

Japanese officials say that with time, the world's second largest economy could develop a reputation in space and enter the lucrative market of commercial launches.

Japan's reputation had fallen so badly in space development that the Japan Meteorological Agency had said it would consider using Europe's Ariane rocket because it was more reliable than the craft available from Japan.

The Meteorological Agency will use the latest satellite to forecast weather and replace its Himawari-5, which is no longer functional. The agency now uses a US satellite for information.

Heavyweight Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was the main builder of the H-2A rocket as part of a government privatization drive.

Masakazu Iguchi, chairman of the Space Activity Commission of the science ministry, said the government was planning to launch a total of 20 H-2As, meaning there would be 13 more launches.

"We hope we will succeed in all the rest. That would mean 19 of the 20 launches would be successful. That's a 95 percent success rate. We want to raise our success level to that," he said.

The latest success was only a step toward that goal, said Tachikawa, the space agency chief.

"Right now, we cannot say we have gained the confidence of the international community. We do not want to be complacent and we are resolved to stay devoted to our work," Tachikawa said.

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