Torrejón, 17/01/2000 (Agence Europe) - Javier Solana, Secretary General of the Western European Union (WEU), visited the WEU Satellite Centre in Torrejón (near Madrid), on 14 January.
The WEU Satellite Centre was inaugurated in April 1993. Its main mission is to "analyse aerial and satellite imagery on zones of interest to WEU, for security purposes", recalls a press release. The Centre, which is also responsible for training European experts in photo interpretation, calls on commercially available satellite imagery, as well as imagery from the Franco-Italian-Spanish high-resolution military observation satellite, Helios 1.
In response to a request from the EU, the press release goes on to recall, the WEU Satellite Centre has, since November 1998, been carrying out a "general security surveillance" mission on Kosovo.