[SatNews] Russia's Rokot carrier rockets will carry two European Space Agency (ESA) scientific satellites into orbit during 2012 and 2013, the head of the ESA Moscow Office said last Monday.

The first launch will deliver to orbit the SWARM satellite, which will survey the geomagnetic field of the Earth. It is unknown what spacecraft will be conveyed into space on the second Rokot, but the launch is expected to take place in the aforementioned timeframe, Rene Pischel of ESA's Moscow office said. The Rokot launch vehicle is a modified version of the Russian RS-18 (SS-19 Stiletto) intercontinental ballistic missile. It uses the two original lower stages of the ICBM, in conjunction with a Breeze-KM upper-stage for commercial payloads. The ESA launched its CryoSat-2 satellite onboard Russia's Dnepr booster in this April. The satellite is designed to monitor the effects of global warming on polar glaciers and has a life span of three years.