CANBERRA, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- Australians have so far surrendered more than 12,500 unregistered firearms as part of the nation's latest gun amnesty, Justice Minister Michael Keenan's office confirmed on Friday.
This is just the second gun amnesty to occur in Australia in the last 30 years. In 1996, then Prime Minister John Howard ordered an amnesty in the wake of the deadly Port Arthur Massacre, in which 35 people were killed by a gunman with an unregistered automatic rifle.
This latest amnesty began last month and is set to wrap up at the end of September. According to the minister, in the past 30 days, the state of New South Wales had the highest handover of illegal firearms (4,961 up to July 31), followed by Queensland (3,500).
Interestingly, Victorians handed over just 751 despite having a comparable population to New South Wales.
Speaking to Xinhua on Thursday, a spokesperson for the Justice Minister said while the numbers were encouraging at this early stage of the amnesty, there were hundreds of thousands of unregistered guns in Australia.
"(The gun amnesty) is three months long and runs until Sept. 30," the spokesperson told Xinhua in an email.
"We know that there's more than 250,000 long-arms and 10,000 hand guns in the illicit market."
Meanwhile, in the minister's press release, Keenan encouraged those with unregistered firearms to come forward before the deadline, adding that those who hand over illegal guns before Sept. 30 would not be investigated by police.
"Already there are 12,500 fewer firearms in our communities. These were firearms that were at risk of ending up in the wrong hands. As we know, just one firearm in the wrong hands can be deadly," Keenan said on Thursday.
The minister also said along with a range of pistols, rifles and shotguns, a number of unregistered and rare historic guns were turned over to authorities.
"Rare items of historical significance have been handed in, including heirlooms from WWI, WWII and the Vietnam War. Queensland police have also received a rifle dating back to 1874," he said.
