Russia; Police

The guidebook I have been using to get around Moscow is called Top 10.  Its organizing principle is to break the city down into its parts and then give you a top 10 list for each of those elements. It's got the top 10 museums and restaurants and top 10 ‘things to avoid’. It makes you a little nervous when number one on the list of things to avoid is the police.

Why avoid the police? Aren't they there to ‘Protect and Serve’? It seems most people don't really trust them to do that.

When I first read the warning in the book, I thought it was probably just isolated problems blown out of proportion. Sure, pass the warning along, but seriously…  I don't need to worry, do I? Well, the Russians I have met are convinced the concerns are real. They are sure their system is corrupt, from top to bottom.

For tourists, the way the scam works is like this: the police are allowed to demand your papers at anytime.  So they stop you on the street and ask for your passport and once they have it, they keep it until you ‘buy it back”. At our hotel they took pains to make copies of our papers and advised us to carry those - never the originals. Once in Moscow we got the same warning.  But no offense to foreigners.  “The same thing happens to us”, our host said.

Is the system corrupt top to bottom? Dominating the local news this week is a report that the mayor of Moscow is being investigated for corruption. He's been there since 1992 and in that time his wife's business ventures have been extraordinarily successful. She is apparently one of the richest women in the world. A billionaire. How did she do it? Her husband’s explanation is that she's really smart. Must be. So will anything come of it? The fact that it is on the news is a bad sign for him. If Putin decides he wants to fight corruption before the election, he’s toast.  Postscript: 9/28/10 – he’s toast.