Global crime proceeds are worth some 2.1 trillion dollars per year, comparable to the nominal gross domestic product (GDP) of leading economies like Britain or Italy, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said Monday. This corresponds to 3.6 per cent of the global GDP, UNODC Executive Director Yury Fedotov told reporters in Vienna.

"It is clear that what was considered a crime is now a global threat to health, security and sustainable development," he said after the opening of the annual UN conference on crime. Corruption in developing countries amounts to 40 billion dollars per year, while traffickers of human beings make 32 billion dollars globally, according to UN estimates.

Copyright Deutsche Presse-Agentur, 2012