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Vyacheslav Ivankov MOSCOW, Nov 3 (Reuters) - President Dmitry Medvedev declared all-out war on Russia's organised crime on Tuesday, saying the godfathers of the criminal world could face life in jail.

The laws signed by Medvedev target a criminal elite that originated in the Soviet-era penitentiary system and still controls much of the criminal underworld. This elite often masterminds crimes but escapes justice by staying in the shadows.

It has its own code of conduct and emerged in the 1930s when dictator Josef Stalin sent legions of criminals, along with political prisoners, to Gulag concentration camps.

In the years following the overnight demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia saw almost daily contract killings as these criminals fought with rivals for spheres of influence in the resource-rich nation's economic and political life.

"The talk is about the ones who identify themselves with the criminal society and do not even conceal it," Medvedev told Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Prosecutor General's powerful investigative unit, in comments posted on the website wwww.kremlin.ru. The meeting was shown on national television.

"The very fact that a person is part of a criminal community is already a legally defined crime, and this is enough for him to be brought to justice," he said. "The ones with a high status in the criminal hierarchy will be jailed for between 15 and 20 years, or for life, according to the law."

It is unclear how many criminal godfathers live in Russia.. Medvedev did not say how the new law would be implemented.

In ex-Soviet Georgia, pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili has overseen the adoption of a similar law. Under the law, if a person admits during a police interrogation that he is a criminal godfather, he is jailed immediately.

This law has led to a virtual exodus of scores of criminal leaders from Georgia. They are believed to have fled mainly to Russia.

"The most important thing is that we will now be able to bring to justice ... not only those who commit crimes, but also the ones who order, coordinate, the ones who to date have stayed in the shadows and dodged responsibility," Bastrykin said.

"... as well as the ones who are in fact the main think-tank in taking criminal decisions," Medvedev replied.

Last month's lavish funeral of Russian mafia godfather Vyacheslav Ivankov, injured in a Moscow sniper rifle attack in July, and its blanket coverage by local media, drew strong resentment from ordinary Russians and opposition politicians. (Writing by Dmitry Solovyov)