Iran plans to launch a manned spacecraft

"In the near future we will be sending a communications probe into space whose lifespan will be one year," the semi-official Mehr news agency quoted him as saying in a live conversation on state television in the western city of Hamadan.

"The government has undertaken plans so that we would be sending a manned spacecraft into space in seven years." Ahmadinejad said last month Iran would send its first manned shuttle into space by 2019. In February Iran test-fired a domestically-made satellite carrying rocket Kavoshgar-3 (Explorer-3).

Western countries suspect Iran is trying to build nuclear bombs and are concerned the long-range ballistic technology used to put satellites into orbit could be used to launch warheads.

Iran, the world's fifth-largest oil exporter, has always insisted its nuclear program is for generating electricity.

In 2009, Iran launched a domestically-made satellite and put it into orbit for the first time. It said the Omid satellite was launched for peaceful telecommunications and research purposes, Kazinform refers to the Arab News.

See www.arabnews.com