MOSCOW, April 2. /TASS/. Russia’s Interior Ministry is cracking down on drugs in the country and has 56 new substances on its radar as potential illicit substances, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev announced.

"Government monitoring measures are being carried out on 56 new potentially dangerous [narcotic] substances," he said at an expanded board meeting summarizing the ministry’s activities in 2023.

A total of 185,000 crimes related to drug trafficking were registered in Russia last year. The number of drug syndicates that were exposed by the police rose by 40%. Almost 22 metric tons of banned substances and 17 tons of drug ingredients were seized. Police officers detected 180 cases of smuggling and uncovered 220 drug labs across the country. According to the Interior Ministry, access to 14,000 websites selling banned substances was blocked over the same period.

"We proactively countered attempts to launder drug money. More than 300 such cases were detected, involving funds amounting to one billion rubles ($10.8 mln - TASS), which is twice as much as in the previous reporting period," Kolokoltsev added.