Australia to launch gun buyback following deadly shooting
Australia’s New South Wales state will start a gun buyback in November, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced, as part of the national response to a shooting spree that killed 15 at a Jewish festival in Sydney, the state capital, reports BritPanorama.
Albanese’s centre-left government enacted laws in January for the gun buyback, tighter checks for gun licences and a crackdown on hate in the wake of the December 14 gun attack at a Bondi Beach Hanukkah celebration in Australia’s most populous city.
The alleged gunmen used powerful firearms that were legally obtained. Australia recorded 4.1 million firearms last year, according to government data, with more than 1.1 million in New South Wales alone.
The buyback is set to be Australia’s largest since a similar campaign after the 1996 massacre in Tasmania’s Port Arthur, where a gunman killed 35 people.
Albanese and New South Wales Premier Chris Minns announced that the scheme would start on November 2, allowing individuals returning rifles and handguns to receive compensation of up to A$1,000 ($700) per firearm.
“Australians are quite rightly proud of our gun laws, but the fact is there are more guns in Australia today than there were at the time of dealing with the Port Arthur gun buyback,” Albanese said in televised remarks.
New South Wales now limits individuals to the possession of four guns following its own reforms prompted by the Bondi Beach attack, which police attribute to a father and son allegedly inspired by the militant group Islamic State. The surviving suspect, Naveed Akram, 24, has yet to enter pleas to a series of charges, including 15 counts of murder.
