MOSCOW, October 4 (RIA Novosti) - The ex-head...

However, Chubais said, suspending the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant that started operating on Siberia"s Yenisei River in the 1970s, over a lack of investment in the replacement of hydraulic wheels "would have been a catastrophe to the Siberian economy and millions of people living there" back nine years ago.

Chubais, who has held a number of influential posts since the 1990s but has always been unpopular with public, was appointed head of Russia"s State Nanotechnology Corporation last September.