At the stroke of midnight on Friday, Edinburgh Castle will be lit up in lights as JK Rowling and her entourage of fans make their way into the Great Hall by red carpet for a live reading of the beginning of 'Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince' to a captive audience around the globe.

Bloomsbury, the publishers of JK Rowling's legendary 'Harry Potter' series of books, have announced the satellite coverage of the event publication night in South Africa (see details below).

The midnight Harry Potter launch at Edinburgh Castle on the evening of Friday 15th July will be attended by 70 cub reporters (aged 8-16) representing media organisations from the UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, India and Ireland.

The cub reporters will arrive at the Esplanade outside Edinburgh Castle by horse-drawn carriage. Two thousand Edinburgh school children and their parents will be seated in the Esplanade outside Edinburgh Castle to cheer on JK Rowling and the cub reporters as they make their way up to the Castle.

Street performers, torchbearers, jugglers and entertainers will complete the carnival atmosphere outside the dramatic backdrop of Edinburgh Castle's medieval façade.

Onto the castle, will be projected a giant image of the "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" book jacket. ITV’s presenter, Stephen Mulhern will be hosting a live 30-minute programme entitled "Harry Potter at the Castle: Magic at Midnight" live from 11.45pm (BST) on Friday 15th July, which will be broadcast live onto a screen (9 metres wide x 7 metres high) on the Esplanade.

Local viewers can tune into the proceedings by satellite from between 11:20pm and 11:30pm:
Satellite: Europestar 1TXP 12
Position: 45 degrees East
Transponder: 11,586.50
Channel: 2
Downlink Frequency:11,586.5 MHz
Downlink Polarity: X POL Horizontal
FEC: 3/4
Symbol Rate: 5632
Encoding: MPEG2 NDS 4:2:0
Line standard: 625 Pal