Russia successfully launched a positioning satellite

Russia successfully launched a satellite belonging to the Glonass Global Positioning System from the northern Plesetsk Cosmodrome in the north on April 26, RIA Novosti said in a statement from the Russian Defense Ministry.

A series of Russian Soyuz rocket launchers - (Photo: AFP)

Glonass-M satellite has been brought into space by Soyuz 2-1b booster rocket on April 26 (Russian time), Russian Space forces spokesman - Colonel Alexei Zolotukhin said.

After entering the specified orbit, the satellite will take several weeks to complete the operation and testing phase, before the official operation.

Reportedly, Russia developed Glonass global positioning system to compete with US global positioning system GPS. It is designed to be used for both military and civilian use.

Currently China and Europe are also developing their own navigation system, named Beidou (Bac Dau) and Galileo respectively.