KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent, St. Vincent, and the Grenadines government Monday called on the United States to do more to curb the easy access of illegal weapons and their easy exportation to Latin America and the Caribbean.
Gonsalves, speaking on a radio program here, decried the proliferation of guns manufactured in the United States and violence associated with the illegal drugs trade as the leading cause for the high rate of murders in some Latin American and Caribbean countries.
“The United States of America had to do something about not having easy access to guns and the easy exportation of guns. They have the resources to help us with that,” he said, noting that Mexico has circulated a draft resolution to be discussed at the January 24 meeting in Argentina of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) “on this very matter.”
The draft notes that the CELAC members meeting in Bueno Aires for their seventh summit “acknowledges that while the region represents eight percent of the world population, it experiences 37 percent of the world’s homicide mostly caused by firearms that have been manufactured or distributed in the3 United States and the trafficked in the region”.
Gonsalves said the draft also states. As a result, CELAC is uri8ng the strengthening of national efforts to reinforce mechanisms to control the legal trade and transfer of firearms to “combat illegal flows which generate a situation of violence and put at risk the security and integrity of the civilian population, especially women, youth and adolescent.”
Mexico is also urging that the arms industry in the United States implement disciplinary measures that will prevent those dealers with irregular behavior from controlling the illegal arms trade in the region, as well as requiring gun dealers to step up to ensure that there are no sales to straw buyers through reasonable identity checks.
He said the draft resolution also urges the gun industry to incorporate technology to make it much easier to track illegal weapons.
In his interview, Gonsalves told radio listeners that St. Vincent and the Grenadines has the fourth lowest suicide rate in the world, which currently stands at one per 100,000, and rubbished claims that increased murders here are due to increased frustration among the population.
Gonsalves said seven of the ten countries with the highest homicide rate per 100,000 worldwide are from Latin America, the Caribbean, and Jamaica.
Prime Minister Gonsalves said the common factor consistent among them is the “hundreds of firearms, and they are connected to the drug trade,” adding, “it’s not frustration, its greed.”
Gonsalves called for an all-society approach to stem the rise in illegal and other criminal activities. He told radio listeners that the police and the legal system must bolster their presence on the ground.
According to Gonsalves, most homicides here have occurred within a 20-square-mile radius, where an estimated 60,000 people reside.
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