Azerbaijan, Baku / Trend corr. S.Babayev / The Minister of Communications
Azerbaijan is not a very large country and will need to utilize all resources of the satellite. The country is able to download only 20-25% of its capacity. The free capacity should be sold to the countries under its coverage.
The coverage zone of the satellite includes Europe and part of Asia - Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Iran. Presently a special working group AzerSat project is functioning at the Ministry with the participation of the international organizations. The financial sources of the project amounting to $80-100 mln have not been defined yet. In 2008 Azerbaijan intends to acquire a place in orbit for its satellite and launching it may take place after 2010.