MOSCOW, March 30 (Itar-Tass) — The Proton-K carrier rocket with a military spacecraft was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome on Friday.

“The launch of the carrier rocket Proton-K with a military spacecraft was carried out ··at 09:49 MSK,” spokesman for the Russian Aerospace Defence Forces Colonel Alexei Zolotukhin told Itar-Tass.

“The means of the ground-based automated control complex of the Aerospace Defence Forces controlled the launch of the Proton-K rocket,” he said. “The blastoff of the carrier rocket was carried out in the normal mode.”

“The estimated time of the spacecraft’s separation from the DM-2 upper stage is 16:27 MSK,” Zolotukhin specified.