ALMATY. Sep 10 (Interfax-AVN) - The Kazakh government will allocate approximately 47 billion tenge (about $346 million) to develop space projects over the next three years, said Kazakh Prime Minister Danial Akhmetov.
"The government has approved the appropriate program that envisages investing up to 47 billion tenge over the next three years. We want to become a real space power," Akhmetov said at a meeting in the Almaty administration on Thursday.
He noted that Kazakhstan has begun carrying out a project to create the KazSat satellite, which is to be launched in December 2005.
The Russian Khrunichev research and production center acquired the contract to create this satellite for Kazakhstan. The satellite will include 12 transponders of the Ku range and will be used for television broadcasting and stationary satellite communications.
Akhmetov said that Kazakhstan intends to start the production of the Baiterek launch complex together with the Khrunichev center in 2005 year.