BRASILIA — A campaign to scoop up the firearms that give Brazil a higher gun death rate than some countries at war is providing a glimmer of hope in a nation that has become almost numb to news of violent crime. A tough new law backing that program came into force on Tuesday, making it more likely that the number of guns recovered will continue to rise. Some experts say killings appear to have fallen since the collection program began, and that the prospects are for... (GunPolicy.org)

Idaho Republican Sen. Larry E. Craig announced yesterday that he has abandoned a bid to seek a repeal of D.C. gun laws in a Senate committee, and Senate GOP leaders indicated that they did not have time to get bogged down in a debate over gun limits in the weeks before Congress adjourns for the fall elections. Craig dropped his effort as opponents of the proposed repeal, including parents of District residents killed by gunfire, lobbied senators and held a news... (GunPolicy.org)

There's plenty of blame to go around for Congress' failure to extend the assault-weapons ban, signed into law in 1994 and allowed to expire this month. President Bush took flak from guncontrol advocates because, after saying that he supported continuation of the ban, he never used the weight of his office to lean on Congress, as he did to get tax cuts enacted. Many in Congress, leery of the all-powerful National Rifle Association, preferred not to fight this battle... (GunPolicy.org)

A quiet, bearded man who stopped eating for three days after being thrown in jail Sept. 11 on firearms charges will be freed Tuesday, Crown attorney Peter Keen told a packed Kenora courtroom late Monday afternoon. William Bruce Montague, 45, a Dryden gunsmith described by his lawyer as a man "who is going through a process of civil disobedience," sat in a holding cell in the Kenora courthouse while his wife and son, friends, reporters and fellow members of Canadian... (GunPolicy.org)