Moscow: Despite the overall decrease of the crime rate, the crime situation in the Moscow region remains disturbing, a Russian official has said.
"The crime rate dropped five percent in 2010. This trend persists for five years now, but the overall crime situation remains disturbing," Andrei Markov, the acting head of the Main Investigation Department for the Moscow region of the Investigation Committee of the Russian Federation, said yesterday.
All-in-all 114,000 crimes were registered in the Moscow region in the past year. The investigative bodies dealing with grave crimes investigated over 3,000 crimes. More than 2,000
criminal cases went to court.
The number of grave crimes reduced in the region last year, Markov said. Thus, 746 murders were established, which is 14.2 per cent fewer than in 2009. The cases of causing grave bodily harm resulting in death decreased by 7.2 per cent. Altogether 527 such crimes were registered last year. The number of rapes dropped 13.2 per cent to 183.
"Due to measures taken, the number of solved crimes was increasing. Thus, 82.5 per cent of murders, 76.2 per cent cases of causing grave bodily harm and 87.4 percent of rapes
were solved last year," Markov said.
Also, 127 crimes of the past years, including 41 murder
cases, were solved in the Moscow region in 2010.
"In order to prevent in the Moscow region the crime
situation that formed in Kushchevskaya settlement of the
Krasnodar territory and in Gus-Khrustalny town in the Vladimir
region, we have intensified the effort to fight organized
crime," Markov said. "Our responsibility increased when
the investigation bodies have become, for the first time,
independent bodies reporting directly to the President of the
Russian Federation," he said.
"While the legal forms changed, our priorities remain
constant - the fight against corruption, protection of
minors' rights, and solving grievous crimes and crimes
committed in the past," Markov said.
PTI
First Published: Tuesday, February 15, 2011, 15:25