MOSCOW, August 8. /TASS/. The number of registered terrorism-and extremism-related crimes in Russia grew in the first half of this year, the Prosecutor-General’s Office has said.

"It is noteworthy that the number of terrorism-related crimes grew by 21.7%. Most of them were committed in the North Caucasus Federal District (550 out of 1,183)," its report said.

According to the Russian Prosecutor-General’s Office, this trend stems from an increase in the number of criminal cases opened into organizing illegal armed groups or involvement in them, organizing the activities of terrorist organizations and participation in the activities of such organizations.

It also noted that almost 60% of extremist crimes had been committed with the use of the Internet (262 out of 442), their total number grew by more than 40%. "Every second such crime is related to public calls for extremist activities," the Prosecutor-General’s Office said. Most of these crimes were registered the Central Federal District and the Volga Federal District.