Poverty usually puts up people to a crime. One of the most widely-spread forms of crime in Tajikistan is drug trafficking. However, the creativity of people apt to crimes is not limited to drug-trafficking. The steeling of telephone cables right from the poles is another way of surviving for impoverished people. Obviously, after the abstraction of a cable several blocks or at least one or two apartment buildings in the city remain without communication and the number of buildings left without communication depends on the length of the stolen cable. The reporter of AsiaPlus, Ramziya Mirzobekova wrote an interesting article about this issue.

Telephone cables attract thieves because they contain a large amount of nonferrous metals, mainly the copper. Thieves process the stolen good and deliver it to special receiving points.

Telephone operators report that this form of crime has increased after the governmental decision to establish special receiving points of nonferrous metals. Last year in August these points increased the price of copper from 3 to 10 somonis.

Local providers of fixed-line telephony are in trouble because of this decision. Almost every day the specialists are fixing the damaged telephone cables. The providers are suffering to sustain losses. The situation got worse because it has become a form of family business.

If previously only the youngsters were steeling the cables then today the adults join them. Recently in the 33rd district we detained a whole family which was in the process of steeling a cable: father, mother and two sons. Soon they are going to be brought into trial”, said a specialist of “Tajiktelecom”.

The law enforcement bodies are unable to fight this crime. There are only some success stories but in general the situation is out of control. The receiving points are legal. People find different ways to provide them with nonferrous metals abstracted from telephone cables and stay clear from suspicion.

…the cable goes through the hands of several people, and usually it is already processed when it is brought to a receiving point: it is melted or cut into small pieces…

…what makes it look not like a cable.

This problem takes place in some other former Soviet countries.