Satellite launch signals China’s ambition to join space powers

CHINA hopes to join an international space station project that already counts leading space powers like the United States and Russia as its members, a government official said yesterday.

China takes great pride in its expanding space programme and sees it as a way to validate its claims to be one of the world’s leading scientific nations. Yesterday, state-run newspapers said China will launch its first lunar probe later this month, just weeks after regional rival Japan successfully sent a lunar satellite into orbit.

But China does not participate in the International Space Station, due in part to American unease about allowing a communist dictatorship a place aboard.

“We hope to take part in activities related to the international space station,” said Li Xueyong, a vice minister of science and technology. “If I am not mistaken, this programme has 16 countries currently involved and we hope to be the 17th partner.”

A reporter had asked whether China in the future would be more likely to compete or cooperate with America in space. Li said yes, but gave no specifics.

China’s Chang’e 1 orbiter will use stereo cameras and X-ray spectrometers to map three-dimensional images of the lunar surface and study its dust, Xinhua has reported previously.

“Preparations for the moon-orbiting project have gone well and the launch will be made at the end of October,” Zhang Qingwei, director of State Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, was quoted as saying on Tuesday by the official Xinhua News Agency.

The regional space rivalry is likely to be joined soon by India, which plans to launch a lunar probe in April.