Argentinian congress approves deal with China on satellite space station Approval for base was related to controversial economic and trade accord Installation would be first outside of Chinas bordersAmid the barren and windswept Andes foothills of Argentinas southern Neuqun province, a large billboard signals in English the entrance to theChinaSatellite Launch and Tracking Control General (CLTC) Chinas first space installation outside its own borders.After two years work, some 300 Argentinian workers led by nine Chinese managers have completed the cement casing for a 35-metre-diameter antenna and on Wednesday night the base was finally approved by Argentinas congress, amid a fierce debate about its true purpose.Designed to track unmanned Chinese missions to Mars and the moon, the installation is due to go into operation next year. But opposition politicians have raised fears that it could eventually be used for military purposes, drawingArgentinainto unwanted confrontation with third countries, such as the US.Its dual civilian-military technology, said opposition senator and presidential hopeful Fernando Solanas. It can be used for both aerospace and missile tracking.Congressional approval for the base was tacked on to a broad and equally controversial economic and trade agreement finalised during President Cristina Fernndez de Kirchners official visit to China earlier this month.As in the case of other vital laws pushed through by Fernndez, the China agreement was approved in a rushed rubber-stamp vote by what Argentinas press calls the presidents automatic majority in Congress, where the presidents FPV Victory Front party holds the majority in both houses.This has not stopped opposition legislators from speaking out loudly against both the space base and the economic deal with Beijing.Fiery opposition legislator Elisa Carri compared the agreement with China with the 1m ($1.5m) borrowed from Barings Brothers in London in 1824 - a loan that it took Argentina 81 years to repay. In a moment of temporary crisis we handed the country over to the British, now were doing the same with China, Carri said during the congressional debate.

This agreement will mortgage our future, echoed opposition legislatorMargarita Stolbizer. Critics of the economic package say it is sowide-ranging that it could compromise the countrys next president, to be chosen in elections this October. The deal will restrict the capacity for governance of whoever takes office on 10 December, Stolbitzer added.

Argentinian international analyst Felipe de la Balze said the base couldcompromise Argentinas international relations. It could have military uses of tremendous importance that could implicate our country in a future military conflict between the US and China, De la Balze told the TN news channel. The agreement is seen by some as the counterpart to an $11bn-loan accorded by China last year that has helped to offset the dwindling reserves of Argentinas Central Bank.We are surrendering the future of Argentinas development, said opposition legislator Jos Ignacio de Mendiguren, head of the UIA industrial union, the main association of Argentinas business leaders. Mendiguren claims the agreement reduces Argentina to providing unprocessed commodities to China while Argentina will be buying value-added goods from the Asian giant.

China has also extended loans for two hydroelectric dams it will build inPatagonia, among other projects. Argentina is the worlds third-largestexporter of soy and China is its main buyer.

Critics have also pointed to a generous 50-year tax exemption for the base and a 50-year lease to China of the 200 hectares (nearly 500 acres)surrounding the antenna.But Argentinas space agency CONAE has dismissed the criticism saying that Argentina has signed a similar agreement with the ESA EuropeanSpaceAgency for a similar base in the Malarge region of the western province of Mendoza. This is part of the policies being instrumented by President Fernndez to insert Argentina into great projects of scientific and technological development, said Conae Secretary-General Felix Menicocci. In return for the tax and land concession, Argentina will be allowed to use the antenna for 10% of its online time.

For the people in the southern region of Patagonia, Chinas space baseis nothing but good news. As the giant antenna, visible from long distances, rises in the barren and wind-swept locality of Bajada del Agrio, 1380 kilometres (857 miles) south of the capital city of Buenos Aires, the 300 workers required for its construction have brought badly-needed economic activity to the town of Las Lajas, some 50 kilometres from the project, where the workers are located.