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Russia’s Chief Prosecutor Yuri Chaika held a meeting in Vladivostok on Monday to blast the Far Eastern prosecutors for poor results in their work in 2006 urging them “to enforce prosecution instead of reporting increased crime statistics.”

Dissatisfied with depressing statistics which showed almost a 30 percent growth in the crime rate within Russia’s remotest district, Chaika lashed out at the Far Eastern prosecutors for absence of effective combat against crime.

“The number of serious crimes is increasing in the region and every tenth crime is connected to drugs. At the same time there are no evident results of prosecutors’ work,” Chaika criticized.

According to the prosecutors’ information, some 60 organized crime groups conduct their activities in the region, most of them connected to illegal timber and fish exports to the neighboring Asian countries.

”Your information about 60 crime groups just kills me,” Chaika said, NTV reported. “We should speak of criminals whom we have charged and put to court. I urge you to stop calculating numbers of criminal groups and to enforce their prosecution,” Chaika demanded.

The number of registered crimes has increased almost three times in the Russian Far East, with rape cases growing 33 percent and armed robberies moving up 30 percent. 56 percent of all cases remain unsolved. Half of the initiated cases were stopped by prosecutors.