In 2003-2004, the Small Arms Survey completed a series of research projects across 20 nations of the southwest Pacific.1 One of these, a survey of the proliferation of small arms and firearm-related violence in the strife-torn Southern Highlands of Papua New Guinea (Alpers, 2005), relies on a range of background information, field interviews from 19...

Contrary to their popular image as low-powered 'bunny guns', .22-calibre rifles are commonly used in multiple shootings.

Among a small, but vocal minority of shooters the universal registration of firearms is both the most ridiculed and the most feared of all measures to control guns. It is a fundamental belief of some gun owners that any register of firearms is merely the first step to eventual confiscation by a corrupt future government...

The history of New Zealand’s gun control law is dominated by failure. Failure of gun owners to comply with the laws, failure of police and courts to enforce and uphold them, and most importantly the failure of successive Governments to provide the will and the resources to see the laws through.

The headline-grabbing effect of the illegal “crime gun” guarantees it more attention than the lawful, homely firearms which kill nine-tenths of shooting victims. Accordingly, public opinion seems willing to tackle the problem of guns in crime while little attention is paid to the much more common “sporting gun” stored, seemingly harmlessly, in sports shops, on...