MOSCOW, March 28 (RAPSI) – Russia’s Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev said during the meeting of the parliament’s upper house on Wednesday that 650 online stores selling drugs were blocked in 2017.

According to Kolokoltsev, the Interior Ministry is also authorized to restrict access to websites used for distribution of banned information about drugs. In 2017, about 50,000 e-mail complaints were sent to the ministry; 20,000 of them were granted and the content in question was blocked, he noted.

Law enforcement officers annually reveal over 200,000 acts of crime connected with illegal drug trafficking, 70% of them are serious and very serious, the ministry reports.

Moreover, Kolokoltsev advocated for creating a mechanism of drug proceeds confiscation in favor of the state on the analogy of the procedure of recovering assets got from corruption-related crimes. An appropriate proposal was considered and approved by members of the State Duma, Russia's Presidential Executive Office and federal agencies earlier in March, the minister said.