Australia Announces Gun Amnesty Program

The Australian government has announced a gun amnesty program. The Australian Justice Minister Michael Keenan announced that the amnesty is intended to allow people who may, for whatever reason, have unregistered guns, to come forward and register them.

Australia implemented tight gun control laws there after a gunman shot 35 people in 1996. The fact that there have been no mass shootings in the country since then is often held up as an example of this strictness working.

A gun buyback program was introduced in the country after that shooting. Some interpretations of this new amnesty are an admission, indirectly, that the gun buyback program has not worked. Guns, such as rifles, that were not turned over or registered in the 1996 buyback and are now illegal. This “grey market” has resulted in thousands of illegal guns. More than 700,000 firearms were surrendered in the 1996 amnesty and buyback program. Handguns were not part of the original amnesty.

Keenan says details of the amnesty, which is not being described as a buyback, are still to come.