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China launches new commercial communications satellite BEIJING (AFP) Apr 12, 2005 Emerging space power China launched a commercial communications satellite late Tuesday, state media reported. The AsiaSat-6 satellite, atop a Long March 3-B carrier rocket, was fired from a launch centre at Xichang in the southwestern province of Sichuan at 8 pm (1200 GMT), Xinhua news agency said. It was a commercial launch for Hong Kong-based APT Satellite Limited, the agency said. AsiaSat-6, which has 50 transponders, will replace AsiaSat-1A, Xinhua said, without saying when the new satellite will be operational. "The successful launch will be of great significance to the development of China's aerospace technology and the expansion of the overseas commercial launch market for China," it said. China launched a US-made commercial satellite, AsiaSat-1, in 1990. In October 2003 it became the third country after the United States and the Soviet Union to achieve manned space flight when astronaut Yang Liwei orbited the Earth 14 times. All rights reserved. copyright 2018 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.
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