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Launches of joint Ukraine-Russia rocket planned for this year, official says. Two launches of the Ukrainian-Russian Dnepr rocket from the Yasny launch base (Orenburg region, Russia) are scheduled for 2012, Head of the State Space Agency of Ukraine Yuriy Alekseyev told journalists on Friday.

"An application has been prepared for two launches from the Yasny launch base in 2012," he said.

According to him, the Dnepr launch vehicle is to place the KomSat-5 South Korean Earth monitoring satellite into orbit in April-May. In September-October, the launch vehicle is to put several Arabian satellites plus Ukrainian payload into orbit. They also plan to continue working on experimental avionics.

Ukraine and Russia have settled all the issues related to cooperation in the Dnepr program, Alekseyev said. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev personally supported the continuation of the program, and Russian Ambassador to Ukraine Mikhail Zurabov reported this to Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov.

The bilateral cooperation on the Dnepr program is to be discussed soon at a meeting with the new supervisor of the defense industry in the Russian government, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, the Ukrainian official said.

The Ukrainian-Russian-Kazakh space company Kosmotras specializes in converting RS-20 intercontinental ballistic missiles (the SS-18 Satan by Western classification) into Dnepr launch vehicles and uses them to put small satellites into orbit. Until recently, Dnepr rockets were launched from the Baikonur space center. At present, the Dnepr rocket is launched from a launch pad belonging to the Russian Strategic Rocket Forces' division in Orenburg region.

Seventeen Dnepr launches have been carried out since April 1999, including 12 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome and five from Orenburg region.