The meeting agenda focused on the performance of the Interior Ministry of the Russian Federation and its agencies in 2024 and their priorities for 2025.
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The President’s remarks at the meeting of the Interior Ministry Board
President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Comrades,
During this year’s expanded meeting, we will review your performance in 2024 and, of course, discuss your tasks for the immediate future.
But first I would like to thank the Interior Ministry’s senior officials and personnel for their dedication and responsibility in fulfilling their professional duties. I would also like to make specific mention of those who are serving in Donbass, Novorossiya and the Kursk Region.
You have been working diligently and professionally in these difficult conditions, doing everything in your power to help people, protect law and order, and ensure that territorial divisions fulfil their quotidian mission in an uninterrupted manner. They have a lot of work. Last year, the issuance of passports to people in the liberated areas of the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions was practically completed.
Colleagues,
It is crucial to build up your efforts in all areas and consolidate the positive trends you have achieved, primarily in ensuring that people stay safe, as well as protecting their health, lives and property.
It is notable that the number of crimes solved, such as murders, assaults related to robbery and house stealing, has increased. Street crime is decreasing too. Overall, I would like to say that the number of repeat crimes, that is, crimes committed by someone with a criminal record, is decreasing.
You also have within your purview important matters dealing with protecting social and transport infrastructure, as well as public spaces, from terrorist threats. I would like to ask you to pay special attention to this area, in particular during the upcoming celebrations marking the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory.
Next. Through the joint efforts of government agencies, the education system, civil society organisations, and, of course, the preventive work of the Ministry of the Interior, the level of juvenile crime has decreased: over the past ten years, this indicator has more than halved. I believe this is the result of targeted efforts in this area.
It is imperative that we continue to do everything necessary to protect young people from criminal threats and from being drawn into unlawful activities, including drug trafficking and cybercrime.
In this context, I request that additional attention be paid to the solve rate for cybercrimes. Particularly since last year, unfortunately, their number, as you are aware, increased, with damages exceeding 200 billion rubles. Moreover, nearly a quarter of the victims and affected individuals were retirees.
I note with regret that the solve rate for such crimes has also declined, standing at approximately 23 percent. Naturally, we recognise that criminals seek and exploit new opportunities and vulnerabilities, but government agencies must come up with adequate ways of responding to these threats.
Your task, in coordination with other relevant agencies, is to develop new, more effective methods to counter this threat, including within a unified system for combating such crimes. Such a system is currently being established in line with Russia’s national development goals.
Our efforts to crack down on drug trafficking must be just as proactive and consistent. The Ministry of the Interior, in cooperation with the Federal Security Service, the Federal Customs Service, and other relevant agencies, must step up its efforts to identify drug dealers, stop drug trafficking – including cross-border flows – and improve mechanisms to combat aggressive advertising and online platforms involved in drug trafficking.
Colleagues,
The Interior Ministry is faced with serious tasks in the sphere of migration. Our priority here is to ensure the security of our society and people, as well as to preserve our cultural identity. We must block illegal migration channels and be more active in using modern migration control instruments. All the necessary instructions have been issued to this effect.
The Minister and I have discussed this issue many times, including just now. I believe that the Government must also redouble its efforts, including on the administrative front, on these matters.
In addition, as we agreed, the Interior Ministry and other relevant agencies must explore ways of converting from paper-based to digital migrant IDs.
I would like to emphasise that these and other innovations should be set out in the updated State Migration Policy Concept, which must be adopted as soon as possible, in 2025.
Of course, we must also fine-tune the existing mechanisms to enable our compatriots to resettle in Russia and help foreigners who share our traditional values and want to live and work in our country move here, especially if they have the necessary skills and education and can benefit our economy.
Combatting extremism remains a priority for the Interior Ministry. Ethnic and religious intolerance, as well as aggressive, militant radicalism are threatening the unity and cohesion of the multi-ethnic people of Russia, as we are well aware. They pose a threat to our sovereignty and even the territorial integrity of our country.
I expect you to respond to such crimes harshly and promptly. It is important to make use of all the tools at your disposal, including preventive measures and dialogue with civil society institutions and religious associations.
The implementation of Russia’s large-scale and long-term development plans calls for creating reliable safeguards for our economy, which implies efforts to eradicate economic and financial crime, including money laundering schemes.
We must keep up the momentum in our efforts to combat corruption in all its forms. I would like to reiterate that corruption undermines the development of our economy, our social services, and our labour market, and has a negative bearing on the business and investment environment.
Special attention must be paid to preventing any attempts to embezzle budget funds when handling defence procurement contracts and implementing national projects, as well as other development programmes. Here, it is important not only to expose the perpetrators but also identify, in cooperation with your colleagues from federal, regional and municipal government agencies, problem areas and risks in the legislation and the administrative practice that may potentially lead to crimes, in order to do away with the prerequisites that make these crimes possible.
As earlier, road safety requires serious attention. We do see improvements here, indeed. I want to thank those of our colleagues who have been working on these matters. Over the past 20 years, the number of car accident deaths has dropped by more than a half. Unfortunately, many people still die or get injured on the road, including children.
Therefore, we must come up with additional measures to upgrade roads and better regulate traffic, as well as prevent accidents. By 2030, the traffic-related death rate must go down by at least one-third compared to today’s rate. This benchmark has been set, and it is up to you to create steady momentum for achieving it.
In conclusion, I would like to cover one more extremely important matter — the Interior Ministry’s staffing needs. I know that the staff shortage is becoming an increasingly serious challenge for the Interior Ministry, especially at the grassroots level. The Minister raises this issue regularly. This problem is certainly systemic and requires a comprehensive solution.
I am referring to offering solid social guarantees and higher wages that, without doubt, must be competitive, as they say in such cases. Other aspects include resolving housing and other social welfare issues.
My request for the Government and the Interior Ministry will be to develop specific proposals on all these problems and submit them for consideration. We must admit that these issues are overdue. Once again, the Minister raises these issues with the Government on a regular basis.
Colleagues,
Our citizens expect that you continue to solve the tasks set for you diligently and honestly. I am convinced that you will not fail their confidence.
Needless to say, I wish you and your loved ones every success, good health and all the best. The tasks you are dealing with, especially these days, are simply monumental. I would like to reiterate what I said in the beginning: overall, the Interior Ministry system operates successfully, and for that, you have my gratitude.
Thank you for your attention.
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Vladimir Putin: Mr Kolokoltsev,
Thank you for your detailed report. There is not much I can add to it. Still, I would like to say a few words to round up this part of your meeting.
We are all aware that our country is living, working and fighting for its future at an extremely difficult and important stage in its history and development. We will soon celebrate the 80th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War.
The people who are sitting in this room are professionals, who know very well what measures were taken in the capital of the Soviet Union – Moscow, and throughout the country to ensure our security, the security of our citizens and transport and critical infrastructure facilities behind the lines during the Great Patriotic War. All of us know this very well.
This does not mean that we must use the same methods that were used, including by the Interior Ministry, in 1941 or 1942. There is no need for that, because the situation is different and does not call for this.
Nevertheless, in the context of the armed conflict, which has been forced on us, and the special military operation, our law enforcement services and their key element, the Interior Ministry, must certainly factor the threats that arise in the current situation into their activities.
Order, discipline and strict compliance with the law must be ensured and guaranteed and be fail-safe. No slackness must be allowed in any sphere of your operation.
You are uniformed men, just like our service personnel who fulfilling their duty to the Motherland on the contact line. You have different tasks, but everything that is being done on the front line and here must serve the same logic and goal – Victory, and the fulfilment of all the tasks set before us in ensuring the safety of the state and the future of Russia.
I would like to repeat that we are pursuing the same goals and our work must serve the same logic which is to achieve the goals set before us. In this, just as all citizens of Russia, I expect you to deliver and I wish you good luck.
Thank you very much.