President Vladimir Putin has dusted off another communist relic by restoring a labour medal introduced under Josef Stalin, despite denying he is taking Russia back to the USSR era.

A week after telling the nation there was nothing in Russia that smacked of the late Soviet dictator, Mr Putin yesterday pinned the Hero of Labour award on five recipients in St Petersburg, the cradle of the 1917 revolution that swept communists to power.

The name has changed slightly from Stalin's Hero of Socialist Labour, which rewarded outstanding work. But the award is clearly back, more than two decades after it seemed to have died with the Soviet Union.

Mr Putin has made no secret of his attempt to appeal to the conservative values and patriotism of the working class, his main power base, and counter the threat of the mainly middle-class demonstrators who led protests against him last year.

"The Hero of Labour title is - a step towards resuming the continuity of traditions, tighter ties between eras and generations," Mr Putin told a ceremony on May Day, the traditional workers' holiday and an important date in the Soviet calendar. "We need to cherish our historical memory, keep in our hearts our pride for the people that built a great country," he said.

The medal, a golden five-pointed star bearing the Russian two-headed eagle, hanging from a white, blue and red ribbon, bears a striking resemblance to the Stalin-era award, except that this had a red ribbon and a hammer and sickle on the star.

The winners included a coal miner, a lathe operator, a brain surgeon, an agronomist and the star conductor Valery Gergiev.

The Hero of Socialist Labour award was won by more than 20,000 people and was a huge honour, intended to encourage industrialisation and glorify Soviet achievements. Famous recipients included the composer Dmitry Shostakovich and the rifle maker Mikhail Kalashnikov. Mr Putin has already brought back the Soviet national anthem and Soviet-style military parades, and critics accuse him of using Soviet tactics to stifle dissent, which he denies.

"Stalinism is linked to the cult of personality, massive legal violations, repressions and labour camps," he told his annual question-and-answer session, broadcast live last week across the country.