WFSA Current News - May, 2004

May 31, 2004

Drug-related gun crime
            Reuters yesterday released an article under the byline of Andrei Khalip in Rio de Janeiro dealing with the extreme violence associated with Brazil’s drug trade.
            Military arsenals are favoured targets of the gangs, and it has become necessary for security to be heavily upgraded wherever military weapons are stored. Using military arms themselves, the gangs are powerful enough to be able to represent a serious threat to trained military and police personnel, to the point where morale is said to be affected by the threat of attack. They are organized enough to command well-armed support for convoys of stolen vehicles delivering illegal drugs.
            In order to improve their own arms supply, police are said to have had to organize raids against bandits who are possessing guns illegally. Holdings are routinely found to include mines, bazookas, hand grenades and other non-sporting military arms.
            The country’s borders are crossed by illegal gun runners using both road and air transport. Arms are siphoned off out of armouries from corrupt soldiers. They are also exchanged for drugs by sea.
            The article follows the usual pattern with statements such as: “Firearms kill about 40,000 people a year in Brazil, more than some wars elsewhere. With about 3 percent of the world population, accounts for 11 percent of murders by firearms according to United Nations data.” There is no suggestion that the murder rate may remain the same in the face of increased severity of laws designed to further restrict lawful firearm ownership for target shooting, hunting and other peaceful purposes such as agricultural use and collecting.
            In articles of this sort there continues to be a horrified tone, usually quite justified, about the scope and severity of criminal usage, but also bearing a tacit suggestion that fewer legally owned guns would inevitably reduce the rates of crime. The details of how this would eventuate are never supplied.


May 23, 2004

Gun amnesty announced for Nigerian state
            The government of the Plateau state in Nigeria yesterday announced a brief amnesty on firearms preparatory to a total ban on private gun ownership.
            Substantial offers of cash are made for the surrender of firearms of any sort before June 7, after which any gun ownership will be seen as "a conscious preparation for violence, bloodshed and murder”.
            The district has been rent by militia activity, with intense fighting between Christian and Muslim groups. An interim district administrator has been appointed in an emergency decree. Arms have been flowing freely into the area from neighbouring countries.

May 19, 2004

New Guinea crime concerns
         In his statement, Mr. Hela is said to have cited the protection of poor people as being central to his motives in calling for increased gun laws. He contrasts the poor with the wealthy, who are able to build high fences to protect themselves.
            The article says Mr. Hela suggests it is now a matter of urgency to “do something” to take control of illegal and missing firearms. The suggestion he provides to accomplish this end is to introduce further registration requirements, accompanied by a gun “buyback”. The aim of this, he says, would be to have the state register such confiscated guns and then resell them.
            Enforced sale programs, no doubt suggested with some influence from Australia, have never been shown to cause any kind of reduction in total crime rates.

May 14, 2004

Antique gun purchases allowed
            The world’s private antique gun collectors make up a far larger group than may often be thought. While firearm museums may have substantial amounts of traffic, the activities of gun-collecting individuals are not very public. Collectors form clubs, and they are often based around historical eras, or around specific genres of firearms. Many have international networks.
            In many countries, their previously-lawful pursuits have been adversely affected by blanket-style legislation passed in the attempt to diminish crime. Restrictions on the private sale of arms likely to be used in criminal activities ought not to impinge on antiques, but in fact they often do. There has been some suggestion in the international community that the United Nations should not need to concern itself with antiques. However, some countries continue to take considerable pains to make it impossible to collect certain classes of old firearms.
            In Michigan, USA, legislation has now been passed freeing pre-1898 handguns from onerous legal requirements. Considerable frustration had accompanied both collecting guns as an activity, and keeping heirlooms.
            Now, no licence or safety inspection will be required for these century-old arms, or their replicas, as long as they use black powder and are in obscure calibres. The same background checks as longarms require will still be enforced.

May 6, 2004

Russian black market firearms
            An article today released by the BBC attributes to Russia growing awareness of the role played by the cottage industry in producing illicit firearms.
            It has long been known that guns can be made quite easily in light engineering facilities. Well known makes and models are copied and indeed have been used to fuel conflict in political hotspots all over the world.
            The Russian television service NTV Mir is said to have reported on the large numbers of unmarked guns being produced in the Izhevsk region, a longstanding Gunmaking centre in Russia . In the district, both Kalashnikov rifles and Makarov pistols are made.
            In times past, it is acknowledged that many workers stole gun parts for later assembly at home, allowing sale of untraceable arms of all kinds. Now, from air guns to pistols to submachine guns, and with a cottage industry in full swing, the going price of around four hundred US dollars will be enough to equip with guns of choice anyone minded to go looking. Easily concealed pen pistols are among the items concerning local authorities, and these are being made there also. There are roadside stalls throughout the region where the finished illegal arms are readily available. The area is not wealthy.
           

May 2, 2004

Canada’s gun registry will not be ‘voluntary’
            The Canadian intention to register all legally-held guns is continuing to be fraught with considerable difficulty. The Associate Defence Minister, Albina Guarnieri, has issued a statement that regardless of the current problems, there will be no formal recommendation for gun registration to become voluntary.
            With several provinces continuing to deny support for it, and the cost blow-out (described previously on this site) continuing to figure largely in the news, the problems continue to mount. The Associate Defence Minister did, however, make it clear that Prime Minister Paul Martin remains committed to gun registration. It is not clear what crime-fighting value is expected to follow from the registration scheme, none ever having been demonstrated in the independent literature.
            A new initiative of some sort is expected within the next few months as the government tries to allay the spreading concerns about the system’s ineffectiveness. More details are available in an article at http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=e4366662-0084-45 .

May 1, 2004

Attempts at further hunting bans in Australia
            Queensland in Australia is almost entirely rural. It has an area of 1.7m square kilometres and half of it extends into the tropics. Its quarry bird populations, made up of waterfowl and quail, are heavily under-utilized. Nevertheless, the usual attacks on hunting are being made by city-based preservationists, five groups of which have now banded together to put pressure on the state government to prevent the opening of the usual game season.
            National Parks and Wildlife officials have already recommended the hunting season be opened as usual.
            Interestingly, the group agitating for the closure includes the once-conservative Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in company with the militant Animal Liberation. Also involved is another previously conservative organization, Birds Queensland.
            A representative of the latter cited cruelty as a reason to ban hunting. This is an increasingly common tendency among advocacy groups. It continues to fail to take into account the facts about annual die-offs of all species in the wild, and it makes the false and unsupportable assumption that banning hunting diminishes the overall number of deaths among quarry species. This is not the case, because the carrying capacity of the land is the ultimate and seasonal moderator.
            The Birds Queensland spokesman, Mike West, was quoted by the Courier Mail newspaper as saying, “I can't see the public supporting gun play at all. People are nervous about guns, and here we are in this day and age considering opening the season.” The emotional and non-factual nature of the attack unfortunately detracts from sensible discussion of the animal management issues.