Russia will not become a police state, President Vladimir Putin has insisted several times over the last two weeks, referring to the actions by the tax police and prosecutor’s office against several powerful businessmen. If Putin means that these actions against the oligarchs do not indicate a return to the totalitarianism of Soviet times, I can only agree. Using the police and the courts to make all citizens — even the most powerful — pay taxes and follow the law, is a characteristic of a democracy, not of a police state.

At the same time, the worries of survivors of the totalitarianism cannot be ignored. Putin’s emphasis on a strong state and his KGB background can only make these survivors uneasy. Putin’s handling of the arrest of Andrei Babitsky and of other journalists, and the indiscriminate use of force in Chechnya indicate that he doesn’t have great respect for, or even knowledge of, Western concepts of civil rights. At the very least, Putin has a great deal of history to live down.

Meanwhile, Boris Berezovsky’s resignation from the State Duma as a protest against "growing authoritarianism" has nothing to do with a police state. Berezovsky seems to want state protection of his right to be better than everybody else. This is just a colorful farce played against the grim background of the current Russian police state.

Yes, Russia is still a police state, even though it’s made great progress since Soviet times. If Putin wants to be taken seriously in his claim that Russia is no longer a police state, I suggest that he implement the following modest proposals.

Take the masks off of police who are taking part in searches and raids. The masks are reminiscent of medieval executioners and have no place in a police force that respects human rights. A masked, armed policeman just cannot be held answerable for his actions by the courts or other civil authorities. Ordinary militiamen should be required to wear name-tags — as is common in America — so that they can be more easily held accountable for their actions.

Militiamen should be required to have a specific reason, based on reasonable suspicion that a person has broken a specific law, for stopping or detaining people. Under current police procedure they can stop, question and detain you for up to two hours with no reason. They are not responsible for explaining these actions to anybody, least of all the victim and the courts.

The periodic mass roundups of citizens in Moscow under the propiska law should be stopped. I know I should use "Moscow registration" instead of "propiska," but everybody knows that it is really the same old Soviet propiska law under which non-Muscovites are not allowed to live and work in the capital. This law is unconstitutional as it effectively limits the rights of citizens to live and travel within the country. It is also used as an excuse by the police to abuse their powers.

It will probably be a long time before Russian police are as polite as British bobbies, or before they read a person his rights before an arrest, as American police do. But until some changes are made, President Putin has no basis for saying that Russia is not a police state.

 

Peter Ekman is a financial educator based in Moscow.