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The Crime rate in Armenia grew by 11,2% or over 2018, but the country’s murder rate hit its lowest point over the past 40 years, Head of the Armenian Police Headquarters, Police Colonel Armen Ghukasyan told a news conference on Wednesday.

According to the official, the number of crimes increased by 2,267 cases to 22,551 last year from the previous year’s 20,284, fuelled especially by big increases in corruption-related offences and crimes against property.

“If in 2017 634 corruption crimes were revealed, in 2018 the number grew by around 2,5 times to stand at 1,353. Such crimes fall under the category of latent crimes, and an increase in their numbers is a positive result itself, since their detection is rather difficult for law enforcement agencies and requires extensive operative and investigative measures,” Ghukasyan said.

According to the official, last year police revealed nearly 5,7 billion drams in corruption-related damages to the state, organizations and individuals, while the number was around 735 billion in 2017.

The police colonel also says more people tend to report various crimes to police now, with the reports on apparent crimes rising by 9,145 last year.

The crime rate increase of 2018 isn’t unprecedented, he says, since it has been recorded six times since Armenia’s independence.

The second leading type of crimes in 2018 was the crimes against property. Last year, the number of revealed cases was 10,112, while in 2017 – 8,102.

Meantime, the crimes against persons is on the decline, as Armenia saw the lowest murder rates over the past 40 years.

Speaking about the crime rates after the declared amnesty in Armenia, Ghukasyan said according to the updated information 40 ex-convicts out of 581 released under the amnesty have again committed 42 crimes.

Not ruling out a possible connection between a crime rate growth and amnesty, the official at the same time says the humanitarian approach towards prisoners is not wrong, adding the ex-convicts simply need to be kept under control.