Russia Signs Law to Expand KGB-Style Power
Agence France Presse reports that President Dmitry Medvedev has signed into a law a bill expanding the powers of the successor to the Soviet-era KGB security service.
The bill, criticized by rights groups, would allow the Federal Security Service (FSB) to issue official warnings to individuals whose actions are deemed to be creating the conditions for crime.
Rights groups say the bill would essentially put the special service above the law and harks back to Soviet times when the much-feared FSB predecessor KGB used warnings to persecute dissidents.
The bill had already sailed through the lower and upper houses of parliament.
The opposition says the FSB security service is already extremely powerful and empowering it further would contravene Medvedev's pledge to liberalize Russia. In response to protests from human rights activists, lawmakers earlier removed an amendment allowing the FSB to summon people to their offices to hand out the warnings and also publish their warnings in the media.