Beijing ? After a decade of preparation and months of speculation, China made a concrete commitment Friday to human space travel, announcing plans to launch a manned capsule into orbit next week and enter one of mankind’s most rarefied clubs — that of the spacefaring nations.

The tentative date: between Wednesday and Friday of next week, “at a proper time.” The number of orbits for the still-unidentified first Chinese “taikonaut” and the Shenzhou 5 craft: 14.

The announcement, which represents both a technological and political victory for China’s leaders, was sent as a flash on the wire of the government’s Xinhua News Agency. It confirmed a date that many state-controlled Chinese newspapers had been leaking for days.

So common has the knowledge become that travel agencies are organizing tours to the province where the launch pad is located.

“All preparatory work for the launch is progressing smoothly,” Xinhua quoted an unidentified space-program official as saying. The military-linked program is highly secretive, and access to its officials is next to impossible.

The launch, scheduled for the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the northwestern province of Gansu, will make China the third country to put a human into space on its own. The former Soviet Union sent Yuri Gagarin up in 1961; the United States launched Alan B. Shepard Jr. less than a month later.

The launch would come shortly after a major annual Communist Party meeting that concludes Tuesday, suggesting an attempt to link the party’s leadership with one of the most patriotism-drenched events in recent Chinese history.