MOSCOW, May 12. /TASS/. Russia has started the creation of separate elements of the Barguzin rail-mobile ballistic missile system, a source in the Russian defense industry complex said on Thursday.

"The design documentation has been elaborated, separate elements of the system are being created, but there is no specific timeframe for its completion and making operational," the source said.

According to him, the timeframe will be clarified in 2018.

In 2014, Commander of the Russian Strategic Missile Forces Sergei Karakayev said that by the decision of the president, Russia started the reconstruction of the rail-based ICBM system Barguzin and its front end engineering design has been completed. Russia withdrew railway-based inter-continental ballistic missiles from operation in 2005. Their successor Barguzin, according to Strategic Missile Force expectations, will surpass by far the parameters of its predecessor and remain in active service at least till 2040. The New START Treaty does not prohibit the creation of such weapons.

According to previous reports, one train of Russia's future rail-mobile missile system Barguzin will carry up to six intercontinental ballistic missiles developed on the basis of the Yars ICBM and will be equivalent to a regiment. A Russian defense industry source told TASS that one regiment of the recreated new-generation Barguzin system will be able to carry six Yars or Yars-M intercontinental ballistic missiles. One Barguzin division will comprise five regiments. It was initially planned to put the system into operation in 2019-2020.

In December 2015, a Russian defense source told TASS that due to financial difficulties the Barguzin development works have been postponed for more than a year and will be completed no earlier than 2020.