HANOI, March 8 (Xinhua) -- The number of criminal cases in Vietnam in 2016 was 54,511, a reduction of 4.4 percent from 2015, according to the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) on Wednesday.
Do Kim Tuyen, deputy head of the MPS's General Department of Police was quoted by local Sai Gon Giai Phong (Sai Gon Liberation) newspaper as saying that last year, organized crimes showed signs of increasing in some localities with many serious criminal cases involving large numbers of suspects and weapons, causing serious concern in society.
Economic crimes and corruption have become more sophisticated and occurred in many sectors, with financial crimes posing serious threats to the banking system.
Meanwhile, drug crimes continued to increase, with more criminals using weapons to fight law enforcement forces, said Tuyen.
In 2016, competent forces solved 42,558 criminal cases, arresting 80,210 suspects. Also, a total of 16,823 economic crimes and 244 corruption cases were brought to justice while 669 hi-tech crimes were investigated and 17,622 violations of environmental laws were handled.
At the same time, a total of 18,742 drug crimes and 234 cases of human trafficking were uncovered. According to the Ministry of Defense, drug syndicates mainly operate in areas bordering Laos, Cambodia and China.
Meanwhile, despite a 6-percent decline in the number of human trafficking cases, the number of victims increased by 12 percent, said the MPS, adding that areas bordering China reported the largest number of human trafficking cases.
