MOSCOW, December 9 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's first 24-hour English-language news channel will begin broadcasting on Saturday, December 10.

"We have several satellites, and we will broadcast to the United States and Canada via IA-5 and to Europe via Hotbird-6," Margarita Simonyan, the 26-year-old chief editor of Russia Today, said. "The Taicom-3 satellite will transmit our programs to Asia, Africa and Australia."

She said people in Russia would be able to watch the channel as part of the NTV-plus basic package.

"Broadcasting will start at 4 p.m. Moscow time [1 p.m. GMT] tomorrow," Simonyan said.

The launch of Russia Today was announced in June, and technical broadcasting began September 15.

"We want to show the way Russia sees itself and the world," Simonyan said when the channel was launched.

She also said the channel would seek to strike a balance between domestic and international news reports.