SES ASTRA, an SES GLOBAL company (Euronext Paris and Luxembourg Stock Exchange: SESG), announced today that it has contracted further capacities for the African continent. New agreements have been concluded since early this year with Unitel Hellas, Skyvision and GS Telecom. The capacity is mainly used for data communication, VSAT services and trunk connections for mobile phone and telephony services within the region.

With these new contracts and after the ramp-up in the fourth quarter, 50 percent out of 42 commercially available transponders will be contributing to the group revenues by year-end 2006. SES ASTRA operations in Africa comprise 34 transponders utilising the African beam of the ASTRA 4A satellite at the orbital position 37.5° West as well as eight steerable Ku-band transponders on the ASTRA 2B satellite at the orbital position 28.2° East.

ASTRA 4A has a high-powered C band payload which allows the use of smaller terminals and greater data throughput, making it ideally suited to data, telecommunications and broadcast applications. ASTRA 4A is able to reach Africa, Europe, and North and South America from uplinks located in any of these continents due to its on board switching matrix.

“With its broad coverage and high power, ASTRA 4A is rapidly becoming the preferred orbital position in Africa”, said Alexander Oudendijk, Chief Commercial Officer of SES ASTRA. “With a row of successful capacity agreements, ASTRA 4A has proven to be the perfect vehicle for telecommunications and enterprise customers in Africa.”

About SES ASTRA                                                                www.ses-astra.com

The ASTRA Satellite System is the leading Direct-to-Home (DTH) satellite system in Europe, delivering services to some 107 million Direct-to-Home and cable households. The ASTRA satellite fleet currently comprises 13 satellites, transmitting in excess of 1700 analogue and digital television and radio channels as well as multimedia and Internet services. ASTRA's two prime orbital positions for DTH services are 19.2° East and 28.2° East. Professional services such as Direct-to cable (DTC), Satellite Newsgathering (SNG) and Occasional Use are offered from the orbital position of 23.5° East.

SES ASTRA is an SES GLOBAL company (Euronext Paris and Luxembourg Stock Exchange: SESG). SES GLOBAL wholly owns three market-leading satellite operators, SES ASTRA in Europe, SES AMERICOM in North America, and SES NEW SKIES, which provides global connectivity as well as coverage. The Company also holds strategic participations in AsiaSat in Asia, Star One in Latin America, SES Sirius in Europe, Ciel in Canada and Quetzsat in Mexico. Americom Government Services provides network solutions and bandwidth to the US government and its contractors. SES GLOBAL provides outstanding satellite communications solutions via a fleet of 44 satellites on 33 orbital positions around the globe.

Additional information on SES GLOBAL is available at: www.ses-global.com

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