Posted on 06/19/2006 5:53:03 AM PDT by 300magnum
LONDON (Reuters) - Three in 10 people questioned in a six-nation survey have been the victim of gun crime or know someone who has been in the last five years, gun control campaigners said on Monday.
The survey of about 1,000 people in each of Brazil, Britain, Canada, Guatemala, India and South Africa found widespread support for tighter international restrictions on trade in firearms, the Control Arms campaign said in a statement.
Control Arms is a joint initiative by human rights group Amnesty International, charity Oxfam International and the International Action Network on Small Arms, made up of hundreds of groups from around the world seeking tighter gun controls.
The survey, carried out by pollsters Ipsos MORI in April and May, was released a week before a major United Nations conference on illicit trade in small arms opens in New York.
Control Arms says there are around 640 million small arms and light weapons in the world and eight million more are produced each year. Weapons kill more than 1,000 people every day, it says.
Control Arms called on governments to introduce global principles to regulate transfers of weapons and ensure that they do not end up in the hands of human rights abusers.
Thirty percent of respondents in the six countries said that either they, someone in their family or someone they knew had been threatened, injured or killed with a gun in the last five years.
The number of people answering "yes" to the question ranged from three percent in India, nine percent in Canada and 11 percent in Britain to 51 percent in both Brazil and Guatemala and 54 percent in South Africa.
More than 60 percent of those questioned said they were "worried about becoming a victim of armed violence," with Brazil recording the highest figure at 94 percent and Canada the lowest at 36 percent.
An average of 62 percent of all those surveyed said it was too easy to obtain a gun in their country.
Eighty-seven percent of all respondents wanted "strict international controls on where weapons can be exported to" and 89 percent backed better controls on arms coming into their country, the survey found.
The problem with this statement is that it ignores the fact that GOVERNMENTS are predomininantly the human rights abusers.
I'm working on it, but I need a bigger toy box...
Why are you adversting a poster that supports gun control?
Most people think only governments having guns is good. People really like police being armed and everyone else not.
Death from road traffic injuries (RTI) and in particular Motor vehicle Traffic Accidents (MVTA) have been characterized worldwide as a hidden epidemic which affects all sectors of society.
An estimated 1.26 million people worldwide died in 2000 from RTI, 90% of them in low and middle income countries.
In 2000, the RTI mortality rate for the world was 20.8 per 1,00,000 population"
http://www.icfmt.org/vol3no1/allahabad.htm
What we need is a worldwide ban on [privately-owned] vehicles and/or more governments' "control" (including fines and possibly jail sentences) for drivers who refuse to turn in their vehicles to said Governments
Kofi, are your listening? An absolute "must" for UN to consider as this is definitely a "Human Rights Issue."
Just think of the additional 1 1/4 million lives a year we can save. /sarc
I worry more about car crime. Not to mention pen crime, knife crime, or computer crime.
The point is that by supporting international gun control you are supporting state-sponsored genocide.
You really don't get it?
All Freepers,
I operate a Smith and Wesson rescue organization. If you have more S&W firearms than you can safely feed, operate or store, I'll be happy to rescue them and keep them in my safe.
-- Lord of War
That statement reminds me of a scene from True Grit. Glen Campbell had missed a bad guy and shot the bad guy's horse instead. John Wayne says something like "Here's the great horse shooter from Texas. 'Believes in puttin' every body afoot. Thinks there'll be less mischief that way.
Great idea, TC, I think I'll open one for everything from AK to Winchester...
How true... And how predictable... Lefties routinely cheer on government abuses (it's for the sake of the children, after all)...
Just trying to do my part to piss off the radical gun hating leftists of the world. ;-)
FReegards...
Two members of an all-female armed group, the Village Defense Committee, undergo military training by the Indian army in Surankote mountains in disputed Jammu and Kashmir.
MARAH, Jammu and Kashmir -- Women in Jammu and Kashmir have now picked up guns against Islamic militants to protect their homes.
At least 30 Muslim women in the disputed region to the north of India and Pakistan have constituted a separate all-women Village Defense Committee (VDC) and are operating with the Indian army in the forested mountains of Surankote in the Poonch district bordering the Pakistani side of Kashmir to fight militants.
"Now militants do not dare enter our village," said 18-year-old Nishat Bee, the youngest member of the group. Her companion, however, corrects her by saying, "In fact militants have not been this way since we picked up guns against them."
On a visit to the twin villages of Marah and Kulali, one finds tall, slender Muslim women sporting rifles on their shoulders while grazing cattle alone in deep forests or standing on top of the roofs of their homes to keep a watch on militants.
"I am proud to fight a Jihad [holy war] against marauders who have cheated us of our dignity and honor," says Shamima Akhter, the 30-year-old commander of this particular women's group.
"Militants who would force us to provide them shelter, food and at times to entertain them physically were harassing us physically and mentally. If we opposed them they would commit rapes or kill our family members. We wanted to confront them and the only way to do it was to acquaint ourselves with the basic functioning of guns and grenades," she added.
The majority of the men of this border belt work in Gulf countries leaving their women, children and elderly back in remote mountainous villages, the access to majority of which is through hours of rough walks that make the women soft targets.
It is common practice for the militants to seek shelter, food or seek sexual favors from these women, and in case of refusal, it is not unusual to rape or even kill them, using locals to work as porters on gunpoint in villages.
The Kashmir conflict traces its roots to 1947, when India and Pakistan simultaneously gained their independence from Britain. Pakistan was formed from the majority Muslim part of British territory, and India from the majority Hindu part.
The state of Jammu-Kashmir, with a majority Muslim population but a Hindu ruler, chose to be a part of India in a process that many believed to be illegal. Since then, India and Pakistan have fought three major wars over Kashmir, and close to 1 million have died in the violence. In 1989 the Kashmiri independence movement turned militant and began to promote the independence of Kashmir from India through violent means.
The VDCs were set up in Jammu and Kashmir in the mid-nineties following a number of massacres of the innocent inhabitants of the troubled region's far-flung villages. As there were no police or army pickets near these inaccessible villages, the Indian security forces provided military training to locals, and equipped them with weapons and wireless sets to counter militant attacks. At least 450 such VDCs are now functional in Jammu and Kashmir.
The foundation of this first women's VDC goes back to March 2003, when local Muslim priest Mir Hussain was killed by a group of mainly foreign Lashkar E-Tayyaba militants when he tried to stop the rape of his wife.
The priest's brother, Fazal Hussain, returned from the Gulf where he had been working, and with the help of the Indian army constituted the first ever-Muslim village committee in the border district of Poonch.
This group helped the Indian army destroy the biggest militant hideout in the famous Hill Kaka bowl in the mountains of Surankote in July 2003. At least 150 foreign militants were killed in the operation.
To avenge those killings, a Lashkar group in April 2004 attacked Kulali village and killed 14 women and children while the men were out on an operation.
Later, in June 2004, the militants executed another attack, which was repulsed by a woman, Khatoon Begum, who had learned to use a 303 Rifle from her son. Although she died in the attack her act helped save at least a dozen members of her family from Islamic guerrillas.
"Khatoon Begum's daring act lead to the foundation of all Muslim women VDC. We were supported by our husbands and fathers and thus trained ourselves in the operation of 303 rifles, SLRs, grenade throwing and other military aspects of how to react and repulse a militant attack", stated another women fighter, Shahnaz.
Tahira Begum, wife of VDC member Tahir Hussain Choudhary and mother of three says, "we want to live with honor and dignity and [for that] we have waged a war against these gun trotters [who are] a blot on the name of Islam.
"It is an amazing feeling to hold a gun in one's hand for a noble cause," Begum added. "On several occasions in the past eight months I have come across jihadis in the forests who are scared and who go into hiding. I am proud to be fighting a jihad against these marauders who cheated us of our dignity and honor."
Trained in the firing, basic handling and cleaning of weapons, as well as in battle craft and field craft drills, nearly every month these women go to nearby army camps to polish up on their shooting skills and to update their knowledge of weapons used commonly by terrorists.
"They have an extraordinary learning zest," said Indian army Public Relations Officer R.K Chhibber.
"We check on their fire ranges and other technical aspects almost every month. They also assist us in vital operations."
Now that's a real neighborhood watch program.
I'm sure the NOW gang approves of this.
It's interesting that the Muslim "militants" (code-word for terrorists) are victimizing Muslim women. I thought they only did that to infidel women. (note: sarcasm tag implied)
Oh heck Brazil had a national referendem pushed by these anti-gun grpups and it went down big time. Brazilian citizens want to own their firearms.
Nice pic.
The rifles appear to be an SLR as used by the British Army up until the late '80's and a good old SMLE .303 like my own rifle - as used by British forces since God was a boy! Even at 1200 yards, you know when you've been hit by an Enfield! :D
"Brazilian citizens want to own their firearms."
Didn't mean to imply that they don't, or shouldn't.
In fact the crime is so rampant there that they *should*.
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