Agenda
Russia is a corrupt, autocratic kleptocracy centred on the leadership of Vladimir Putin, in which officials, oligarchs and organised crime are bound together to create a "virtual mafia state", according to leaked secret diplomatic cables that provide a damning American assessment of its erstwhile rival superpower.
The Guardian
Institutional Structure
The principal law enforcement agencies are the Ministry of the Interior of the Russian Federation, the Federal Customs Service, the Federal Security Service, the Federal Guard Service, the Federal Drug Control Service as well as the Office of the Prosecutor General and the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation.
Ministry of Interior
The Ministry of the Interior (MVD) is a federal agency of the executive branch of the Government of the Russian Federation. The Ministry controls and organizes the work of the internal affairs agencies of the Russian Federation (the police) and of the Ministry’s interior forces. Acting in accordance with the laws of the Russian Federation, it also coordinates and carries out criminal investigations.
History
Organized crime in Russia is in large part controlled by a heterogeneous network of criminals referred to as the Russian Mafia. The mafia has its roots in an old fraternity known as Vory v Zakone (Thieves in Law). They were the dominant criminal force in Russia, until after WW2, when war veterans hardened by war and later imprisoned for crimes, killed many of them and largely took their place in prisons and in society.
Current Status
One of the last mafia kingpins from
Russia’s wild 1990s has died. Rather than marking the end of an era, the event
is reminding Russians just how much their government has occupied the role once
played by organized crime.
The Russian Mafia Is Dead. Or Is It?
Key Policies
Anti-corruption
After Putin’s reinauguration last May, the Kremlin stepped up its anticorruption efforts, with a series of laws to increase the transparency of government.
Forensics
From now on anyone in Russia who commits a serious crime will not only have their fingerprints taken but will also have their DNA profiles held on a police database, effectively holding the criminal ‘hostage’ against committing crimes in the future.
International Cooperation
The Russian Federation has special bilateral and multilateral international treaties on legal assistance in criminal matters with 67 States. In particular, Russia is a Party to the 1959 European Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters and to the 1978 Additional Protocol thereto, as well as to the 1993 Convention on Legal Assistance and Legal Relations in Civil, Family and Criminal Matters and the 1997 Protocol thereto, concluded within the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
Russia has pulled out of an anti-crime accord with the United States, the latest sign of rising tensions between Moscow and Washington.
Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev signed an order to scrap the 10-year-old agreement "because it was no longer relevant," his office said on Wednesday.
Key Figures
Crime rate
General statistics of 2011
• 1683.3 thousand criminal cases were registered (8,7% less than during 2010)
• 32.9 thousand people were murdered; 40.5 thousand people suffered serious harm
• The damage caused by crime was above 190 billion rubles (7.3% less than during 2010).
• The number of registered economic crimes decreased 26.6% comparatively with the year 2010 statistics. In total 195 thousand criminal cases and frauds were investigated by Russian police.
53% of registered criminal cases related with hostile takeovers.
Challenges
Russian TNOC has other features which are less familiar to western law enforcement agencies operating in countries where the rule of law is paramount. It has connections. There are close, almost seamless, links with the ‘deep state’ kleptocracy of government, parliament, civil service, law enforcement and business at all levels, as well as the military and, above all, the security services. As a result, Russian law enforcement structures offer international agencies only very limited cooperation.
Organized Crime
In Russia and other countries of the Former Soviet Union (FSU), it is not just a question of organised crime being big business. Big business is organised crime. And, given that no big business in Russia can operate without government approval (just ask the numerous exiles who left Russia in 2003 after the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky) it follows that the state and organised crime are inextricably linked.
Miscellaneous
HUNDREDS of Russians have deposited millions of dollars in cash in the Mediterranean island of Cyprus in what local bankers suspect has been a giant scheme to launder the profits of covert Middle East arms sales and the proceeds of Moscow's mafia.
Transition to Globalisation
The popular belief is that if Russian money travels outside Russia it must be tainted – by the mafia, graft, uranium smuggling or something like that. But in reality most of the money belongs to Russian firms. In fact both private and state-run companies use Cyprus as a tax haven because the country has a corporate tax rate of 10 percent which is 50 percent lower than Russia’s.
Globalisation > Economy > Grey Area > Money Laund. > Tax Havens
Transition to Tools
The so-called Russian mafia, which includes gangs from many former Soviet republics, is involved in a wide range of activities in Berlin and other German cities. Working mostly within the Russian community, its members blackmail owners of video parlors, electronics outlets and restaurants, making clear that they are fully prepared to murder anyone who resists their demands.
Tools > National > Germany > Dom. Policies > Social > Crime
Transition to Actors
Semyon Mogilevich, one of FBI's most wanted people, identified as real power behind billionaire owner of Ukrainian-based RUE
Actors > Business > Big Business
