Are Guns Registered In Venezuela

Venezuela prohibits sales of guns, ammunition

CARACAS, Venezuela - The Associated Press

Venezuela prohibits sales of guns, ammunition

Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez. REUTERS Photo

Venezuela'southward authorities banned sales of guns and armament Fri with a measure that officials said is aimed at fighting rampant trigger-happy crime.

Private gun shops are now prohibited from selling guns under the measure, which had been announced previously.

Only the police and the military will exist exempt from the ban on gun sales, Justice Government minister Tareck El Aissami said.

Critics noted that only a small-scale per centum of guns take recently been sold legally to permit holders and said most gun sales take long been illegal and unregulated.

Luis Izquiel, a lawyer who heads a security commission for Venezuela's opposition coalition, said that while in that location are about 25,000 gun permits legally registered with the authorities, there are many more weapons on the streets. In 2010, Amnesty International estimated there were a full of 10 one thousand thousand firearms in the land.

"Here criminals don't use legal firearms," Izquiel said.

Polls have repeatedly said that Venezuelans view violent crime equally the land's top problem.

President Hugo Chavez's government has announced several new anti-law-breaking measures ahead of the country's October presidential election.

Terminal calendar week, the government imposed some other measure out prohibiting people from possessing guns in public places such as urban center squares, parks and restaurants.

In February, the government announced temporary measures outlawing gun possession in public areas as well as halting gun sales. The latest measures have made those changes permanent.

"Now no one is going to be able to get new guns or take new permits," El Aissami said Friday, according to the state-run Venezuelan News Agency.

He said his ministry building will have authority over the supply of weapons to police forces.

Venezuela has in recent years had i of the highest homicide rates in Latin America. El Aissami has said that in 2010 the country had 48 murders per 100,000 people.

The Venezuelan Violence Observatory, a watchdog group which tracks crime, says that the murder charge per unit has continued to rise and that last year there were more than 19,000 homicides, a record for the country.