SEVERODVINSK, March 19 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's Defense Ministry will create an infrastructure to provide comprehensive maintenance for the country's new Borei-class nuclear submarines, a senior ministry official said Sunday.

"We are coming to realize that not only the weaponry itself is important, but its life cycle is, too," Deputy Defense Minister Gen. Alexey Moskovsky said. He was speaking in the Arctic port of Severodvinsk, where he had come to attend the keel-laying ceremony for one of the submarines to be built under the Borei project, the Vladimir Monomakh.

Nuclear submarines' maintenance should cover every stage of their life cycle, from development through salvage, Moskovsky said.

The construction of Borei-class submarines, designed to carry Bulava intercontinental ballistic missiles, is part of the Russian navy's current modernization effort. The first such boat is to be commissioned in 2008.