MOSCOW- Russia’s space agency said on Monday that Angola’s first nationaltelecoms satellite, AngoSat-1, was inoperative and Russia would buildanother one for launch in 2020.

Launched in December from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, thesatellite has been plagued by problems including the loss of communicationsand is now regarded as a write-off, Russian and Angolan officials told anews conference on Monday.

“We are going to start the AngoSat-2 construction,” Igor Frolov, arepresentative for Energia, a unit of Russia’s space agency, said.

The written-off satellite was insured and Russia will pay the rest of theundisclosed costs for the second satellite.