After keeping silent for days, China on Tuesday confirmed that it had launched a missile to kill a satellite this month, but stressed it had not plans to enter into an arms race in the outer space.

"We have confirmed the testing to relevant countries, including the United States," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman, Liu Jianchao told media persons in Beijing.

At the same time, Liu emphasised that China had no plans to enter into an arms race in the outer space. Earlier reports from the United States said that China shot down an ageing weather satellite by slamming into it a ground-based missile about 860 km above earth.

Liu did not say when the test was conducted. So far, the United States and the former Soviet Union were the only ones to have successfully conducted the satellite-killing tests but the last test was carried out some 20 years ago during the fading era of the cold war.