Russian rocket puts Iranian satellite into orbit

The Soyuz rocket blasts off at the Vostochny cosmodrome (Roscosmos space corporation via AP)

A Russian rocket has successfully put an Iranian satellite into orbit in a launch that underlined increasingly close cooperation between Moscow and Tehran.

Russia’s state-run Roscosmos corporation said that a Soyuz rocket blasted off from the Vostochny launch facility in the country’s far east to carry the Iranian satellite and 18 Russian ones into orbit.