BRASÍLIA—In his first hours as Brazil’s new president, Luiz Inácio
Lula da Silva
issued sweeping changes to tighten the country’s firearms laws and reverse looser rules imposed by his predecessor,
Jair Bolsonaro,
that prompted a million new gun registrations since 2019.
A presidential decree, which took effect Monday, suspends new registrations of guns for hunting and sport as the leftist government works to rewrite the country’s 20-year-old gun laws. The decree forbids owners from transporting loaded weapons, suspends new applications for gun clubs and reduces the number of firearms permitted per individual from six to three.
“Brazil does not want more guns: we want peace and security for our people,” said Mr. da Silva, 77, shortly after being sworn in as head of Latin America’s biggest nation, two decades after he first took office in 2003.
Even under Mr. Bolsonaro, private gun ownership in Brazil was still tightly controlled in comparison to the U.S., where gun owners possess nearly 400 million weapons, according to the Geneva-based group, Small Arms Survey. But in the wake of violence in Brazil by heavily-armed criminal gangs in recent years, many Brazilians have argued individuals should have greater access to guns. Recent polls show that half of Brazilians want a firearm.
Mr. Bolsonaro had answered those calls, passing more than 40 presidential decrees to ease restrictions on buying and carrying weapons.
By November 2021, Brazil had registered a total of 2.3 million firearms, up 78% from 1.3 million when he first took office in 2019, according to a study by Sou da Paz, a research group whose name means I am of Peace.
Registrations among collectors or those using firearms for hunting and sport rose particularly fast, reaching 673,818 by June 2022 from 117,467 in 2018, according to the Brazilian Forum on Public Safety, a policy research group.
A shooting club in São Paulo. Handguns and rifles acquired legally in Brazil are often stolen or sold on the black market, according to a research group.
Photo:
Matias Delacroix/Associated Press
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