Egyptian government official said Monday that this country plans to launch three new satellites by the end of 2006 or early 2007, the official news agency MENA reported.

Ayman Desouki, head of Egypt's National Authority for Remote Sensing said the first satellite, named as Egyptsat 1, will be launched from Kazakhstan.

Egyptsat 1 will carry two remote sensing devices -- an infrared one and a multi-spectrum one, he said on the sidelines of the 6th international conference of the African Society of Remote Sensing.

Egyptsat 1, once launched, will be the country's first satellite for scientific research. It has been jointly built by Egypt's National Authority for Remote Sensing and Space Sciences in collaboration with Ukraine.

The second and the third satellites will be named Egyptsat 2 and Sahrasat, respectively, said Desouki.

He said the satellites are aimed at helping Egypt in the fields of water resources administration, monitoring natural disasters, climatic changes and rural planning.

Egypt has already launched a number of satellites for nonscientific purposes. Nilesat 101 was launched in 1998 and Nilesat 102 in 2000, according to MENA.

These satellites are now delivering more than 150 digital television channels as well as radio and multimedia services to more than several million homes over North Africa and the Middle East, from Morocco to the Gulf region.

Source: Xinhua