Armed Violence and Guns in East AsiaEast Asia, despite its universally restrictive gun policies, is home to some of the world’s largest firearms exporters and emerging industry giants, particularly South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and China.1 2 China has had the world’s greatest value increase of military small arms exports between 2000-06.3 Gun policies throughout the region are some of the most restrictive in the world. Japan and South Korea place heavy restrictions on civilian gun ownership.4 5 China has a government allocation system whereby civilian ownership is prohibited, and those who can prove a need for a firearm are lent one by the government.6 7 Civilian possession and gun homicide rates throughout East Asia are among the lowest in the world. Japan’s civilian possession rate, in particular, is ranked 164th of 179 countries.8 Estimated civilian gun possession numbers range from 50,000 in Mongolia, to 725,000 in Taiwan, and China ranks 3rd in the world for the number of firearms held by civilians, with 40,000,000.8 Public health reporting across the region is rare at best. Just over half the countries of this region have reported gun homicide statistics, Taiwan has the highest rates with 0.6 per 100,000 population in 2008.9 Other reporting countries have very low gun homicide rates ranging from 0 for Hong Kong,10 Japan,11 and South Korea,12 to 0.1 for Mongolia.13 China, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan are amongst the twenty largest military stockpiles, with respectively 21,000,000, 6,200,000, 4,700,000, and 2,600,000.14 China is also believed to have the largest number of law enforcement firearms in the region, with an estimated 1,950,000 firearms, followed by Japan with 250,000.15 China, Japan and South Korea are the only active participants in the international small arms programme.16 17 18 19 20 Japan is the only country of the region to have signed and ratified the Arms Trade Treaty. Mongolia and South Korea have also signed, but not yet ratified, the Treaty.21 For information on armed violence and gun control laws in each country and territory of East Asia, please use the search tools in the left hand column. |
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