Gun amnesty haul highlights need to aim higher

• Published date: 01 March 2020
• Publication title: Sunday Times

Another firearms amnesty has ended with about 200 unlicensed firearms being surrendered, but despite repeated amnesties armed crime is rising, reinforcing the need to move more decisively in controlling the menace.

'The amnesty, though only a week long, was effective, and the police received guns that are in service and in good condition,' (Crimes) Prashantha Jayakody, said, pointing out that under earlier amnesties people turned in archaic guns that were literally falling apart.

This time, the firearms handed in included 12 and 16-bore shotguns, other double-barrelled guns, rifles, revolvers and pistols.

An outdated survey in 2006 showed there were about 300,000 firearms in the country - and even more in the then conflict-stricken northern and eastern areas, a senior researcher on disarmament, Vidya Abeygunewardena states, citing...