Iran launches satellite amid spike in regional tensions

Iran said it had conducted a successful satellite launch into its highest orbit yet, the latest for a programme the West fears improves Tehran's ballistic missiles.

The Soraya satellite was placed in an orbit at some 750 kilometres above the Earth's surface with its three-stage Qaem 100 rocket, the state-run IRNA news agency said on Saturday.

It did not immediately acknowledge what the satellite did, though telecommunications minister Isa Zarepour described the launch as having a 50-kilogramme payload.

The launch was part of Iran's Revolutionary Guards' space programme alongside Iran's civilian space programme, the report said.

There was no immediate independent confirmation Iran had successfully put the satellite in orbit. The US military and the State Department did not immediately respond to request for comment.

The announcement comes as heightened tensions grip the wider Middle East over Israel's ongoing war in Gaza, and just days after Iran and Pakistan engaged in tit-for-tat air strikes in each others' countries.

The United States has previously said Iran's satellite launches defy a UN Security Council resolution and called on Tehran to undertake no activity involving ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons.

UN sanctions related to Iran's ballistic missile programme expired last October.

The US intelligence community's 2023 worldwide threat assessment said the development of satellite launch vehicles "shortens the timeline" for Iran to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile because it uses similar technology.

Intercontinental ballistic missiles can be used to deliver nuclear weapons. Iran is now producing uranium close to weapons-grade levels after the collapse of its nuclear deal with world powers.

Tehran has enough enriched uranium for "several" nuclear weapons, if it chooses to produce them, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly warned.

Iran has always denied seeking nuclear weapons and says its space programme, like its nuclear activities, is for purely civilian purposes. However, US intelligence agencies and the IAEA say Iran had an organised military nuclear programme up until 2003.

The involvement of the Guard in the launches, as well as it being able to launch the rocket from a mobile launcher, raise concerns for the West.

The Guard, which answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, revealed its space programme back in 2020.