Turkmenistan's President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov on Tuesday hailed the launch of the gas-rich Central Asian country's first telecommunications satellite, saying it showed the country had reached a "cosmic level."
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Cape Canaveral in the United States at 2303 GMT Monday after a 49-minute delay caused by cloudy conditions, and sent the TurkmenAlem52E/MonacoSat communications satellite into orbit.
Thales Alenia Space, the French company that built the telecoms satellite, reported Tuesday that it had gone into orbit.
Calling the satellite launch "a landmark," Berdymukhamedov pledged it "will be followed by further successes of the country, now already on a cosmic level."
Berdymukhamedov personally gave permission for blast off, and said the launch marked "permanently neutral Turkmenistan's entry into the global satellite system."
He also hinted it would help expand the government's control over domestic communications in the restrictive former Soviet republic.
"This satellite will boost the quality of broadcasts of national television and radio channels and will create conditions for live TV (and) a high-quality system for the Internet," he said.
Turkmenistan is regularly blacklisted as one of Freedom House's "Worst of the Worst" list of repressive countries for its lack of civic liberties.
Its authorities drew criticism from rights groups in the last month by forcibly removing satellite dishes from private homes in an apparent attempt to increase control over access to information.
According to Human Rights Watch, Turkmenistan's government began dismantling the dishes in late March, claiming they ruined the view. In some cases "unidentified people set about destroying satellite dishes," the group reported.
Human Rights Watch warned that satellite receivers broadcasting foreign programming were the "last lifeline to the outside world" for Turkmens, and that their removal infringes people's freedoms.
Turkmenistan's state-owned satellite packages focus on entertainment and do not include programming that is critical of the government, the group noted.
Turkmenistan will hold presidential elections in 2017.
The government's satellite was launched by California-based SpaceX, a relatively new player in the space industry which has committed itself to making spacecraft reusable.
It is the first satellite in space to be partially built using 3D printing, according to Thales Group.
