Russia’s bid to create a rival to the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, has been delayed by equipment flaws and other technical problems, a senior Cabinet official said Wednesday.

First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov acknowledged that Russia’s Global Navigation Satellite System, or GLONASS, failed to become fully operational at the year’s start as the government had planned.

Ivanov said the system is still short of the required number of satellites and produces a poor precision. He warned a meeting of space officials that those responsible for the failures will be held accountable.

“The orbital grouping doesn’t yet make GLONASS services accessible across the entire territory of Russia,” Ivanov said in televised remarks. “The necessary level of reliability of onboard equipment hasn’t been achieved.”

GLONASS, which serves both military and civilian purposes, was conceived during the Soviet era as an answer to GPS and is supposed to have 24 satellites. Their number dwindled after the 1991 Soviet collapse, but the government has earmarked funds to revive the system to its full strength thanks to Russia’s windfall oil revenues.

Russian officials have said, however, that the existing GLONASS satellites have a significantly shorter service life than their U.S. analogues, and efforts to develop longer-lasting ones have been slow.

December’s launch of three GLONASS satellites was supposed to bring their number to 18 - the minimum needed to provide navigation services throughout Russia. But some of the older satellites have been phased out of service, leaving the system short of its full capacity.

“We will be forced to make revisions in the program,” Ivanov said.

Russian officials had earlier planned to make GLONASS available worldwide by 2010, for which it would need to have 24 satellites.