It appears that China is eager to exploit the opportunity the US has given them by our ending foreign aid in Africa.
I guess that MAGA world sees this as irrelevant?
China has forged nearly two-dozen pacts with African nations in its bid to surpass the U.S. in space. Investments in satellites and infrastructure are winning friends – and giving China more eyes on the skies – as America slashes help for developing countries.
On the outskirts of Cairo, a cutting-edge space lab was supposed to be the first in Africa to produce homegrown satellites. Step inside the plant, though, and the made-in-Africa image begins to fade.
Satellite equipment and parts arrive in crates from Beijing. Chinese scientists scan space-tracking monitors and deliver instructions to Egyptian engineers. A Chinese flag hangs from one wall. The first satellite assembled at the factory, hailed as the first ever made by an African nation, was built mainly in China and launched from a spaceport there in December 2023.
The Egyptian satellite lab is the latest advancement in China’s secretive overseas space program. Beijing is building space alliances in Africa to enhance its global surveillance network and advance its bid to become the world’s dominant space power, Reuters has learned. China has publicly announced much of this space assistance to African countries, including its donations of satellites, space monitoring telescopes and ground stations. What it hasn’t discussed openly, and which Reuters is reporting for the first time, is that Beijing has access to data and images collected from this space technology, and that Chinese personnel maintain a long-term presence in facilities it builds in Africa.
The satellite plant, which began operating in 2023, is part of a suite of space technology that China has gifted to Egypt over the past two years. Transfers that have been disclosed publicly include a new space monitoring center, which features two of the world’s most powerful telescopes, plus two Earth observation satellites launched in 2023 – the one that was assembled in Egypt, and another manufactured solely in China. In addition, China that year launched a third, Chinese-made satellite for Egypt, one capable of military-grade surveillance, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
I guess that MAGA world sees this as irrelevant?
China has forged nearly two-dozen pacts with African nations in its bid to surpass the U.S. in space. Investments in satellites and infrastructure are winning friends – and giving China more eyes on the skies – as America slashes help for developing countries.
On the outskirts of Cairo, a cutting-edge space lab was supposed to be the first in Africa to produce homegrown satellites. Step inside the plant, though, and the made-in-Africa image begins to fade.
Satellite equipment and parts arrive in crates from Beijing. Chinese scientists scan space-tracking monitors and deliver instructions to Egyptian engineers. A Chinese flag hangs from one wall. The first satellite assembled at the factory, hailed as the first ever made by an African nation, was built mainly in China and launched from a spaceport there in December 2023.
The Egyptian satellite lab is the latest advancement in China’s secretive overseas space program. Beijing is building space alliances in Africa to enhance its global surveillance network and advance its bid to become the world’s dominant space power, Reuters has learned. China has publicly announced much of this space assistance to African countries, including its donations of satellites, space monitoring telescopes and ground stations. What it hasn’t discussed openly, and which Reuters is reporting for the first time, is that Beijing has access to data and images collected from this space technology, and that Chinese personnel maintain a long-term presence in facilities it builds in Africa.
The satellite plant, which began operating in 2023, is part of a suite of space technology that China has gifted to Egypt over the past two years. Transfers that have been disclosed publicly include a new space monitoring center, which features two of the world’s most powerful telescopes, plus two Earth observation satellites launched in 2023 – the one that was assembled in Egypt, and another manufactured solely in China. In addition, China that year launched a third, Chinese-made satellite for Egypt, one capable of military-grade surveillance, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
