Will New Laws Help Russia Take Down the Mafia?

Russia's laws have long been weak and unspecific when it comes to combating organized crime, part of the reason that the underworld has thrived in the country in the post-communism years. But the government may finally be getting serious about cracking down on the mafia. In the wake of the embarrassing release of mobsters in September, President Dmitri Medvedev proposed harsh new legislation targeting organized-crime figures, making a rare admission that "the legal code does not have a response to the increasing social dangers of these crimes." Within weeks, the parliament approved the measures by an almost unanimous vote.

Perhaps most significantly, one of the new laws is aimed directly at the powerful heads of Russia's various mafia clans, who rarely get their own hands dirty. Under the statute, leading an underground criminal group is now punishable by life in prison. "As a rule, [the dons] don't directly participate in criminal acts, and so they go unpunished," Oleg Morozov, deputy speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament, wrote last month on his party's website. "The president's legislation gives more precise definitions of what can be called a criminal conspiracy and a criminal organization."