Pakistanis buy guns in droves as insecurity creeps in

Middle class Pakistanis in scores are now procuring guns and other arms to protect themselves, as a surge in Islamist violence has led to fears that the country may be headed for a wave of violent kidnappings, extortions and other crimes.

Registrations of guns and rifles have recorded a new high, Wall Street Journal reported quoting officers who attributed this trend to rising sense of anxiety, fear and insecurity among the people, who now seeks arms to protect themselves.

This has come in vogue among the middle-class people who foresee a wave of violent kidnappings and robberies that will target those who look like they might have money.

These fears have been generated as over the past year, Pakistan has witnessed the assassination of popular political leader Benazir Bhutto and bloody bombing of Islamabad's Marriott Hotel.

The recent terror strikes in Mumbai, allegedly carried out by 10 Pakistani militants trained here, has further frayed the nerves of the people in New York.

"The spreading Islamist insurgency in the country has led to a wave of insecurity, and people doubt the ability of the new civilian government to safeguard them," paper said.

"People buy weapons because they're insecure," a senior Interior Ministry officer told the paper. "No need denying it."

The 11,758 murders recorded in the first 11 months of 2008 were the highest in Pakistan in at least in a decade, it said quoting Islamabad police, who compile nationwide crime statistics.

Arms licenses are issued by numerous Pakistani agencies. Local authorities and police hand out permits for weapons that can be used only within their states.

The Interior Ministry licenses non-automatic weapons that can be carried across borders between Pakistan's states. The prime minister's office gives clearance for automatic assault weapons that can be used throughout the country.

Firearm licenses issued by the Interior Ministry rose sharply in 2008. Licenses for 12-gauge pump-action shotguns, used by private security guards and also duck hunters, more than doubled over 2007, the Journal said quoting ministry figures compiled through year's end.

Over the same period, the ministry granted 47 per cent more licenses for 30-bore pistols and 53 per cent more for 9mm handguns.

The ministry's chief spokesman, the paper said, didn't respond to requests for comment about the surge in gun licenses.

Some middle-class Pakistanis, it says, have appealed to politicians for help in obtaining licenses.

Many licensed arms are sold in the military city of Rawalpindi. Down the street from the city's Liaquat National Bagh, small arms shops, their walls lined with shotguns and long-barreled pistols, are scattered amid mom-and-pop stores.

"A gun can be your friend," one gun-shopper, Sifarish Khan, was quoted as saying.

Weapons purchased legally in the Rawalpindi shops, the Journal said, are typically 10 times as expensive as those readily available on the black market in NWFP and its capital, Peshawar, a hub for weapon smuggling from Afghanistan.

But urban Pakistanis tend to shun the illegal arms bazaars in an area known for tribal codes, bandits and Islamic insurgents.