Global Security Newswire

Russia last week announced plans to conduct an ICBM trial firing next month from a Kazakh space facility following the lifting of a 2009 prohibition on such activities at the site, RIA Novsoti reported (see GSN, Oct. 22, 2008).

Moscow is calculated to provide $115 million each year for rights to conduct operations at Kazakhstan’s Baikonur cosmodrome, according to RIA Novosti. The site, more than a half-century old, serves as Russia's primary point today for firing rockets. Its facilities are also employed in assessments of Russian ballistic missiles.

“Now that the ban has been lifted we will (test) launch an ICBM (from Baikonur) in November,” RIA Novosti quoted space agency chief Vladimir Popovkin as saying on Friday (RIA Novosti, Oct. 8).