China Daily Network, July 27, according to the United States progressive website recently reported that due to the lack of gun regulation in the United States, the Gun Control Law in the Central American country of Guatemala has been broken, and thousands of illegal guns have been brought into the country.
According to a number of foreign media reports, the problem of illegal imports of weapons from the United States affects not only Guatemala, but also the whole of Central and North America. These include U.S. neighbors Canada, and The Central American countries of Chile, Honduras, El Salvador, and Mexico, all of which have linked gun violence in their own countries to the illegal export of weapons by the United States.
Screenshot of the report
Guatemala: Gun control has been tightened, but it is difficult to stop the illegal influx of a large number of smuggled guns into the United States
The crime rate in the Central American country of Guatemala has declined year after year, but violence will increase again in 2022. According to the country's National Institute of Forensic Sciences, violence in Guatemala increased by 9.9 percent in the first quarter of 2022. Since January 2022, more than 2,000 people have been killed, most of them caused by gun violence.
The obsession with guns in the United States and its reluctance to impose reasonable restrictions on firearms have directly led to an increase in violence and crime in Central America, particularly Guatemala. Because of the readiness of weapons, criminal groups can illegally trade in U.S. weapons through the U.S.-Mexico border and bring weapons to other countries.
"Most of the weapons used in organized crime come from the United States." Carmen Rosa de León, a sociologist working with the International Light Weapons Action Network, told the media.
Article 38 of Guatemala's 1985 Constitution recognizes the right of citizens to bear arms. In 2009, Government Decree No. 15-2009 introduced stricter arms controls. The law, which requires purchasers to be at least 25 years old, prohibits the purchase of fully automatic weapons, severely limits the permits allowed private security guards to publicly carry weapons, and reduces the amount of ammunition that individuals can purchase each month.
"No one can go into a gun store, buy a gun and take it home, you have to register with the Ministry of Defense after buying it here." Carlos Menocal, Guatemala's former interior minister, said. He explained that the person who purchased the weapons must carry receipts and weapons to the General Directorate of Arms and Ammunition Control under the Ministry of Defence, which is responsible for supervising and managing all legal firearms. In addition, all legally possessed weapons must be registered with their ballistic characteristics.
"The black market in Guatemala is very active," Menocal said, "and this powerful market makes 90 percent of gun murders in Guatemala caused by illegal weapons." "It is estimated that 80 percent of the weapons on these markets come from the United States. The widespread use of illegal firearms means that guatemalan prosecutors' offices are often unable to trace the weapons used in shootings.
The Guatemalan government's efforts to control firearms have been met with resistance by some people associated with criminal organizations. In 2017, Guatemala's Congress reformed to discuss 2009 arms control legislation, expanding the national register of gun ballistic information to facilitate investigations linking weapons to violent crimes. During the debate, Fernando Linares Beltranena, then a far-right congressional member, brandished a plastic gun during a speech opposing the reform proposal. Beltreña is an armed rights advocate in Guatemala. He sought to join the National Rifle Association, based in the United States, and publicly opposed measures and decrees restricting the carrying of weapons.
Mexico: U.S. gun manufacturers fuel and profit from Mexican violence
Mexican Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval estimated in 2020 that more than 2 million illegal firearms have entered Mexico from the United States over the past decade, with 1.7 million of these weapons in the hands of those deemed a threat to national security.
In the face of growing gun violence in Mexico, the government of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador filed a lawsuit against 11 U.S. gun manufacturers in April 2021 for $10 billion, accusing them of fueling violence by Mexican drug cartels.
In Mexico, the sale of weapons is tightly regulated, with only one gun shop affiliated with the Ministry of Defense in the country that can sell guns, and the process of applying for weapons is very strict. The illicit circulation of weapons exacerbates the random violence in Central America. The Guardian quoted data from the U.S. Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Administration as saying that 179,000 firearms seized in Mexico and Central America were sold in the United States.
"The problem for the U.S. is that there's a lack of control over who buys weapons," De Leon said, "and there are a lot of markets on the border [with Mexico], and eventually those weapons fall into the hands of Mexican drug dealers, and then they start flowing to Central America." ”
Alexandre Cyrolio, chief legal officer of the Mexican Foreign Ministry's legal department, also said that the root of the problem is that the United States produces a large number of guns without restraint, and the control of gun sales is very lax, with nearly 10,000 gun stores on the US-Mexico border alone. U.S. gun companies make huge profits in their businesses at the cost of harming Mexican lives and undermining Mexican social order, which is intolerable.
Canada: U.S. weapons are used for criminal activities across Canada
According to National Public Radio earlier in July, shootings in Canada have been on the rise since 2014.
Screenshot of the report
Unlike the United States, where weapons are federally regulated, possession of firearms is not a constitutional right. Since Canada's deadliest mass shooting in 2020, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's administration has enacted a series of anti-gun violence measures, including a ban on more than 1,500 trades in military-grade offensive weapons. Improved and modified versions of such firearms are also prohibited from being bought and sold.
The latest gun control bill, Bill C-21 introduced at the end of May, proposes to limit domestic handgun supply by freezing new sales and transfers. The bill is currently under consideration by the Canadian House of Commons Committee. The bill deliberately adds penalties for smuggling firearms, one of the most difficult challenges facing Canada as it tries to address the issue of cross-border arms trafficking from the United States.
"Our problem in Toronto is a pistol that originated in the United States," Myron Demkiw, deputy chief of the Toronto Police Department, told Canadian lawmakers at a gun violence hearing in February 2022. He also said that last year in his city, "86 percent of crime pistols came from the United States."
Benoit Dubé, head of an interdepartmental gun violence task force in Quebec called Operation Centaur, told the parliamentary committee that most of the weapons seized for crime in Quebec also came from the United States.
Jooyoung Lee, a sociologist at the University of Toronto who studies gun violence, said: "Many states close to the border have big loopholes in their laws, and it's easy to bypass the law if you want to own a gun and then transfer it to the illegal market."
In 2020, the killers of the mass shooting in Nova Scotia killed 22 people in 13 hours, and the killers' 4 guns were all obtained through illegal means, including 3 from the US state of Maine.
"American guns kill not only Americans, they also kill Canadians. However, there are still things we can do, and that's exactly what we have to focus on," said Wendy Cukier, president of the Coalition for Gun Control, a Canadian nonprofit. The coalition has been lobbying for legislation, including a ban on the possession of handguns.
(Editor: Ma Rui Editor: Hu Xiaoshan)
Source: China Daily