Ja: Stemming the flow of illegal guns

The American process, however, should not end only at the issuing of licences for the export of guns in the formal trading system. We would appreciate substantially more aggression on the part of the American authorities in seeking to detect weapons leaving their country as contraband.

The situation has improved in the two-and-a-half years since 9/11, but there is room, it seems to us, for far more rigour on the part of US Customs and other agencies in searching for illegal guns leaving the US, even if the effort does not reach the level of their attempt to prevent contraband entering America.

But the responsibility does not rest only with the United States. There is plenty to be done in Jamaica, not least of which is to deal with the corrupt practice in the constabulary of granting gun permits to persons who do not meet the criteria. In some cases, criminals and other questionable characters, it has been reported, are granted gun licences for a fee.