A Russian rocket manufacturer is offering to send space tourists on a ride around the moon for $100 million US and a top official of the nation's space agency said the project could be viable. The trip around the moon would include a week-long stay aboard the International Space Station, Energia chief Nikolai Sevastyanov said Wednesday. The project would involve reliable Soyuz booster rockets that have been the mainstay of the Soviet and Russian space program since the 1960s.

The cash-strapped Russian space program has sought to augment scarce government funding with revenues from space tourism. Californian Dennis Tito paid the Russian space agency about $20 million for a week-long trip to the International Space Station in 2001, and South African Mark Shuttleworth followed suit the a year later.