UrBC, Yekaterinburg, July 30, 2015. 431 instances of corruption-related crimes were registered in Sverdlovsk Region in the first half of 2015, which exceeded the figures for a year earlier by 15%, head of Sverdlovsk Region Prosecution Service’s Anti-Corruption Enforcement division Vladimir Kurochkin announced at a press conference in Yekaterinburg.

Kurochkin said fifty-five cases out of these involved charges of bribe-taking (Article 290 of the Russian Federation Criminal Code), twenty-two involved charges of abuse of power (Article 285), and some of them – charges of fraud (Article 159).

195 corruption-related criminal lawsuits were processed by courts in the first half of the year, with two hundred people found guilty. Not a single verdict of not guilty was pronounced.

‘This actually means our investigative authorities have grown more efficient,’ Kurochkin said.