Military intelligence to get major new satellite centre

The Czech Republic is to get a major new satellite centre to be used by the country’s military intelligence service and NATO. It will be able to retrieve images from satellites shortly after they have been taken and will provide intelligence experts with a detailed picture of reality on the ground. It can also be put to civilian use in the case of floods or other natural disasters.

The minister of defence, Karla Šlechtová, told Tuesday’s edition of Právo that it was not just an extraordinary system that could quickly deliver information but also proved that Czech specialists were keeping step with their international counterparts.

The centre will be financed by hundreds of millions of crowns from the budget of the Ministry of Defence and will go into full operation in 2020.

Author: Ian Willoughby