Large increase in Drug use and related crime in Russia

Drug-related crime and trafficking in Russia has almost doubled in the past twelve months, according to the Interior Minister, Anatoliy Kulikov.

He told a government commission, set up to fight illegal drug trafficking, that criminal groups in Russia were earning more than a billion dollars a year from hard drugs.

According to the Minister, Russia has almost two million "active drug users" and a quarter of a million registered addicts, almost three times as many as five years ago.

The number of women addicts has grown over 500 per cent in the same period and three times as many teenagers are reported to be regular drug users

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service