Russian society achieved democracy and freedom of individual through much suffering, President Putin

Vladimir Putin has named the major "supporting structures" of the Russian Constitution.

While speaking on Thursday at the State Kremlin Palace reception to mark Constitution Day, the President pointed out above all "democratic principles of organization of the state, political and economic freedoms of Russian citizens".

According to President Putin, the major idea of the constitution is that "the government must serve society, i.e. people, work for the benefit and success of each of its citizens." Vladimir Putin stated that the constitution established "clear rules for all branches of power." According to him, "these frameworks of constitutional behaviour became instruments of concordance of various political interests." "They are our guarantee against repetition of experiments on society." Putin stressed that "the constitution solidified the federation, marked a new stage in relations between power levels." Putin stated that "nowadays, proceeding from own experience we are completing important work to delineate authorities. On that basis we are strengthening local governments and power bodies in subjects of the Russian Federation, including in a crisis-stricken one like Chechnya." He announced that he had signed a decree setting the procedure of holding a referendum in the Chechen Republic.

The President stated that the road towards the constitution was difficult.

"It was actually a road towards a new democratic state," the President said, adding that "for more than 10 years now we have been pronouncing the words which became habitual - "new Russia." The head of state stressed that "but to think of that, we talk about the country with 1,000-year-long history of existence." According to him, the country knew many examples "of unlimited power of the government, as well as its inefficiency, weakness." Putin stated that "in Russia democracy and freedom of the individual were achieved by society through much suffering." According to him, a new Russia emerged a great deal thanks to the authors of the constitution, the country's basic law.

The Russian constitution expanded the horizons of human freedoms and rights. However, the President indicated that people were still "facing arbitrary law and unlawful actions." The President stated that "the duty of everybody vested with power is to act for the benefit of people, which means to strictly follow the spirit and word of the Constitution."