President Ma Ying-jeou says that Taiwan has seen its lowest crime rate in seven years.
Ma was speaking at the 2015 International Seminar on Regional Safety and Cross-Border Crimes on Wednesday.
“To put it simply, the total number of crimes committed in Taiwan has fallen to a historic low during my seven years in office. Prior to my inauguration, there were 490,000 criminal cases per year with a fewer than 75% of cases cracked," said Ma. "With our persistent efforts, the number of total crimes fell to 300,000 last year with 86% of cases cracked, improvements of 40% and 11% respectively.”
Ma explained that violent crime saw the biggest drop, a drop of 80%. Meanwhile, robberies fell 70%. Losses due to internet fraud fell from NT$18.6 billion to NT$3.3 billion.
Ma said that Taiwan would like to rejoin Interpol in order to make its efforts at preventing crime more effective.