"I will note that over the past year, Russia has retained its positive trend of falling numbers of serious and particularly serious crimes, lower numbers of murders, rapes, robberies and banditry were recorded. The crime clearance rate has increased. A significant amount of work has been carried out in protecting budged and state funds from various criminal encroachments. A larger number of past crimes have been cleared, with one in four in the category of serious or particularly serious," Putin said during an an extended meeting of the board of the Interior Ministry.
The annual meeting reviews the ministry's performance over the past year, as well as its future goals.
The number of registered particularly serious crimes fell by 1.5 percent in 2015 compared to the previous year, according to Russia's Prosecutor General's Office figures. The number of serious crimes fell by 2.8 in the same period.