Australia Thursday commemorates the twentieth anniversary of the slaughter of Port Arthur, which left 35 dead and 23 wounded, determined to maintain its "strong and responsible" policy control firearms.
On April 28, 1996, Martin Bryant opened fire indiscriminately against tourists visiting Port Arthur, a former penal colony of the British Empire reconverted historical monument, 75 kilometers southeast of Hobart, capital of the southern island of Tasmania.
The slaughter of Port Arthur prompted the Conservative government of then Prime Minister John Howard establish a national law governing the possession, sale and trafficking of weapons, which until then varied by Australian states.
The national pact reached for the gun control allows since the government has the ability to establish laws governing the arsenals and decide who could have or no gun license and keep a record of armaments.
Before the ceremony, the prime minister of Australia, Malcolm Turnbull, told a local radio station that tragedy is "a reminder of how valuable life" and congratulated Howard for his courageous political reaction that served to "keep Australian insurance "from the slaughter of Port Arthur.
Turnbull, who will discuss the national agreement for arms control with the head of government of Tasmania, Will Hogdman, remarked that "although agreements such as these should be reviewed, there is a factor that is absolutely non-negotiable: continue to maintain our strong position and liable to arms ".
However, in the last 16 years Australia has imported more than a million firearms, according to Philip Alpers alert, expert from the University of Sydney and founder of the portal "GunPolicy.org".
"The proud statement by some Australians that the country has solved the problem of arms can be a temporary illusion (...) the private arsenal of weapons is greater than it was before the slaughter of Port Arthur" Alpers remarked in an article published in the online magazine "the Conversation".