New Incentives in Global Gun Control and Disarmament
December 1, 2003
by Joseph P. Tartaro
Executive Editor
Iraq isn’t the only world hotspot that the United Nations, NATO or the US-lead coalition are trying to pacify with disarmament. Threats of criminal prosecution, jail time and fines don’t seem to bring many guns to the collection points, so the folks in charge are trying to sweeten the pot with incentives.
In Afghanistan, they are handing out medals to any of the former soldiers for various warring factions and warlords who hands in his guns. There is also the promise of job training and employment, opportunities for enlistment in the new Afghan army and even assistance in setting up a small business. And there was even a parade to make the veterans of many battles feel like they have also been discharged from military service honorably. Some Afghans who have been fighting someone at least since the Soviet occupation in the 1970s are turning in their guns, but not everyone by a long shot.
The problems in embattled countries like Afghanistan are complex. There is a long tradition of personal independence and a culture of private arms, a tradition that proved costly to the Russians who had to fight against tribesmen armed with ancient bolt-action rifles as well as Stinger surface to air missiles supplied by the CIA.
Even as the new government of Hamid Karzai, supported by the US and its Allies, tries to get a measure of national order and control in the country, in the provinces there are still old disputes and powerful local warlords who enlist their fighters in the smallest villages.
Macedonia
In Europe, there’s a new car raffle, but far from as many takers as hoped.
“New Renault? No thanks, I’d rather keep my AK-47.” That seems to be the message coming from Macedonia, a Balkan hotspot that the international community has been trying to disarm for years.
The arms amnesty in Macedonia is failing despite what is believed to be a handsome offer—the chance to win a new car, according to a report in the British publication New Telegraph.
The last time that the people of Macedonia were offered a weapons amnesty, one man turned up in an armored personnel carrier that he had made off with during the 2001 conflict between ethnic Albanians and Macedonians.
This time around, the citizens have proved more reluctant to hand over their hardware. The authorities in this Balkan country are offering a handsome bribe: give us your illegal AK-47 and you will be entered in a lottery to win a new car or a computer. Yet it seems people would rather have their guns than drive away a mint Renault Clio.
In the town of Veles, 35 miles south of the capital of Skopje, the mayor proudly displays 29 surrendered “sporting guns” which turn out to be rusting air rifles. In the first two days of the amnesty, only one other firearm—a pistol—had been turned in.
Meanwhile, on the outskirts of Skopje, at another of 123 collection points, a pristine Second World War-vintage Schmeisser submachinegun testified to the excellence of German engineering some 60 years after the Third Reich was defeated in Yugoslavia.
Johan Buwalda, of the UN development program in Macedonia, defended the lottery scheme, launched recently. “For many people, a weapon is a major investment—perhaps they have sold a goat to buy it,” he said. “We have to compensate them for that.”
Although the former Yugoslav republic was spared the inter-ethnic violence that devastated the Balkans in the early 1990s, it came close to civil war a decade after independence.
After the violent 2001 uprising, ethnic Albanian rebels agreed to lay down their arms in return for greater rights. Many people fear that they will still need their weapons either if fighting resumes between the Albanian and Macedonian communities, or if violence flares up between Albanian nationalists and the police, as it did in September.
“I won’t be handing in my guns. Why should I?” asked a shopkeeper in Skopje. “No one knows what will happen to Macedonia. The prizes are c—p too.”
The interior minister, Hari Kostov, marked the start of the collection program by handing in his own hunting rifle and pistol in front of television cameras. Others handing over illegal arms were reluctant to speak to anyone, especially the press.
Saturation
Paul Eavis, director of Saferworld, a foreign affairs think-tank, said that the collection program was not without risk because of the recent violence, but believed that the lottery scheme would at least boost awareness of illegal weapons. “In countries like Bosnia, where collection has gone on for years, you get to a saturation point where most of those who are willing to surrender weapons have already done so,” he said.
Various estimates put the number of privately-owned arms at between 100,000 and 500,000 in a country with a population of 2 million. That could be one gun for every four people.
Those who don’t turn in the illegal arms during the no-questions-asked amnesty will face severe penalties after Dec. 15.
“The most important thing is to address underlying security concerns by promoting community-based policing, for example, so members of both ethnic communities feel sufficiently secure to give up their weapons.” Guns are an accepted part of Balkan life but the amnesty has been welcomed by the international community.
The US and NATO are keen to bring a sense of normality back to Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia, where the 400-strong military monitoring mission originally was slated to end this month.
At the UN they seem to see no difference between disarming the citizens of the embattled countries of the world ripped by ethnic and religious conflict and civil strife and disarming the citizens of peaceful countries. The UN continues to hold meetings on its global gun control program, the anti-gun non-government organizations keep issuing new studies, and the governments of countries as distant as Brazil and Thailand focus on the guns rather than eradicating the deeper roots of crime, violence and civil war.
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