TV channels are part of the battleground over Iraq's future

China's biggest colour television maker says it has won an order to supply one million satellite TV tuners to an Iraqi customer.

The order is worth $50m to TV maker Sichuan Changhong, according to the China News Service.

"We have already delivered the first batch of 100,000," Changhong spokesman Liu Haizhong said.

He declined to say who had bought the satellite TV tuners.

Media wars

Changhong sold TVs to Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries prior to the US-led war to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

Many media organisations have been drawing up plans to broadcast to Iraq since the US-led coalition's military victory.

The UK and US governments have combined to support a new TV station - "Towards Freedom" - which began transmitting from military aircraft but plans a more conventional home.

At least three Iraqi political groups who opposed Saddam Hussein have established radio stations within Iraq.

Eager to go

Contracts to supply post-war Iraq are proving controversial as European firms are worried that they will lose out to US firms and US Democrat politicians are on alert for any sign of corruption in the Bush Administration.

Changhong's spokesman said the firm received the order for digital satellite tuners before the recent May Day workers holiday.

The first batch was reportedly loaded onto a charter plane at the airport in the firm's home town of Chengdu, in the western Chinese province of Sichuan.

Changhong, which has 17% of China's domestic TV market, reported first quarter profits rose fourfold to 78.9m yuan ($9.53m) in 2003.

Nonetheless, the deal is likely to be a welcome one for a firm that is battling to preserve market share in a saturated market by slashing the price of its top-end products.