The rise in Criminal Cases: Causes and Remedies

According to the definition given by governmental organs, apart from incidents cause by anti-government armed opposition, violence, murder, theft, human kidnapping, rape and other crimes, are criminal cases, and since last three years these cases has increased and is increasing day by day.

Quoting a governmental source, fifty criminal cases are being occurred on a daily bases in Kabul and according to the Kabul police chief, 205 individuals related to 117 criminal cases were arrested in Kabul in the last two weeks.        

Considering the background of criminal cases in the past years, why these incidents are increasing day by day? What are their main factors? In this paper, we have discussed these topics.

Level of registered criminal cases

Since last seven years, the graph of criminal cases increases in the country. In 2008, totally 6786 criminal cases were registered and these numbers increased to 2010; however, the graph of criminal cases somewhat decreased from 2010 to 2011. But, criminal cases began to increase at that start of 2012 and the number of registered criminal cases reached to 15593. This number increased in 2013 and the total number of registered criminal cases reached to 27122 in that year.   

According to the seasonal statistical indexes of the Central Bureau of Statistics, 15050 cases are registered in 2014; however, these statistics are related to the first three quarters of the year and the statistics for the last (fourth) quarter are not included because they are yet published in the reports. (See, Figure 1)        

Considering the quarterly statistics of 2014, it appears that the total number (15050) of first three quarters is higher compare to the first three quarters of previous year (2013); the reason is that almost 14556 criminal cases were registered in first three quarters of 2013.

The statistics of criminal cases presented above, are registered cases only and unregistered cases are not included. 

Figure 1: Statistics of crimes in different year

Year	2008	2009	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014
Crimes	6786	7164	7010	6929	15593	27122	15050*

Source: Afghanistan’s statistics annual report (2013) and seasonal statistical indexes (2013)

Unregistered Criminal Cases

Considering corruption in judicial organs, not arresting criminals or releasing them, lack of governmental authority in remote areas and influence of Mafia on politicians in the country, the real numbers of criminal cases are high than above-mentioned statistics, then.  

According to a survey, considering above-mentioned factors, a lot of victims of criminal cases do not report to the governmental security organs. A man who had faced an armed robbery said: “We did not report the police because they do not arrest criminals. Even if we believed that the criminals would be arrested, we were not going to let ourselves to be bothered by long procedures of judicial organs and corruption.”

The above example enlighten that lack of trust in the police, not arresting the powerful criminals, hidden political hands and Mafia behind the criminals, corruption in judicial organs and lack of governmental sovereignty in remote areas are the factors that cause criminal cases to stay unregistered.

Factors behind the rise in criminal cases

Criminal cases do not have specific factors, however, the factors of every criminal case are different from each other; anyway, we can name economic, social, judicial and political factors as factors for increase in criminal cases:

1. Corruption

Corruption is considered as an important factor for increase in the level of criminal cases. According to the annual report of Transparency International, 2014, Afghanistan is globally the 4^th country with high corruption and according to the survey conducted by Afghanistan’s Integrity Watch in 2014, judicial organs and police are the most corrupt governmental organs in Afghanistan. As judicial organs and police are involved in corruption more than others, it spontaneously provides opportunities to criminals to release themselves in exchange for bribes and to conduct crimes with more surety and confidence; that is why a lot of arrested criminals have criminal background. However criminals believe that they are going to be released in exchange for bribes that much the amount of crimes increases in the country. On the other hand, unprofessionalism of the security forces has caused them to become failed in preventing crimes, and in some cases to establish a cooperation/coordination with criminals.         

2. Powerful men and Politicians

The other factor of increase in criminal cases is powerful men in Capital Kabul and several other areas in the country, in order to achieve their virulent goals, support criminal groups and defend them against the law. As some politicians cooperate with criminals and some Mafia groups, so arresting them by police seems to be impossible.

A lot of cases among the registered cases in the past years are as this; people were being kidnapped in the daylight from secure areas of large cities using blacked-glasses vehicles, however, neither the criminals are arrested and nor they are punished.       

3. Cultural invasion

Considering the latest statistics of criminal cases, it shows that cases related to rape[1], gambling[2], murder[3] and beating[4] are on the rise. For example, robbery and gang-rape incident of Kabul’s Paghman that took place in September, 2014 and other gang-rape incidents are worth mentioning. Uncensored media and cultural invasion of other countries in the last 14 years is considered as a main factor behind the mentioned unpleasant incidents. Unmoral TV serials and films, which are broadcasted by famous TV stations are sponsored by different donors that are against our religious values and culture, and meanwhile, their message is not positive, either. However, it causes moral disorder in our society, also.       

Our religious values are continuously insulted by these channels; they try to promote moral corruption in the society instead. In the case, preventing corrupt programs from being broadcasted and broadcasting useful programs and programs that increase public awareness causes criminal cases to become decreased.        

4. Illegal weapons and irresponsible armed individuals

Meanwhile, some security officials think that smuggling of illegal weapons from neighboring countries into Afghanistan, which are being sold with lower prices and are then used in criminal cases, is one of the main factors behind criminal cases.

Besides that, in most of the areas, regional powerful men and irresponsible armed individuals that usually has link with high-level governmental officials play a lot of role in committing these crimes. For example, some days ago, 22 people were killed as a result of armed conflict between two armed groups that were carrying weapons without any concern in Baghlan.     

5. Poverty and Unemployment

Basically, unemployment is the main reason behind some crimes especially armed robbery. A lot of scientist conducted researches and generated theories that show a link between crimes and unemployment and/or fewer privileges. Whenever unemployment increases, earning money through legal means becomes limited, and instead of that, earning money through illegal means (crimes) increase.    

For now, that rate of unemployment is increased in the country more than ever. This is the reason why a lot of people are involved in theft, kidnapping, robbery and other crimes. Besides that, family violence, in most situations, have link to economic problems.

Remedies and Recommendations

In order to decrease the rise of criminal records the following recommendations and remedies must be considered:

• Influential policies on preventing corruption should be made and applied in security and judicial organs; because both of the organs are corrupt more than any other organ in the country.
• Anti-criminal organs should be empowered and the salaries of their employees besides the training should be increased in order their level of engagement in corruption become decrease.
• Efforts for providing work opportunities should be made; in order the youth shouldn’t become involved in unpleasant criminal cases due to unemployment and poverty.
• The government’s judicial organs should punish the criminals accordingly, in order to discourage others for committing crimes.
• The Statistics of criminal cases in the country should be gathered and the factors of criminal cases should be bolded through statistics, surveys and researches and struggle on eliminating these factors should be done accordingly; because criminal cases pervasively affects the community negatively.

* Statistics for the last (fourth) quarter are not included.

[1] Considering Afghanistan’s statistics annual report (2013), rape crimes increased from 281 in 2011 to 996 in 2013, P. 94

[2] Considering Afghanistan’s statistics annual report (2013), gambling crimes increased from 20 in 2011 to 291 in 2013, P. 94

[3] Considering Afghanistan’s statistics annual report (2013), murder crimes increased from 1231 in 2011 to 2941 in 2013, P. 94

[4] Considering Afghanistan’s statistics annual report (2013), the total number of beating crimes from 2011 to 2013 were 4819, P. 94