More than 102.000 armed documents issued in Montenegro, amendments to the Law in the process

According to the records of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MUP), 102.154 armed documents were issued to 67.892 persons, Radovan Popović from the MUP said in Colors of the Morning.

The largest number of weapons licenses were issued in Podgorica, and statistics show that the largest number of weapons are owned by people over 50 years old.

According to the same data, 40.639 firearms licenses were issued to hunters in Montenegro.

"Our law on weapons does not limit the number of weapons that a person can have," says Popović.

Mladen Marković from the Police Directorate announced that the latest research by the Council for Regional Cooperation showed that when asked if they owned a weapon, 90 percent of the 6.000 respondents declared that they already had a weapon.

"A surprising figure, but it is not different from the region," says Marković.

Psychologist Nataša Vuković said that she does not hear about security from candidates who ask for an armed list as a reason for obtaining a permit.

"When a candidate comes to ask for a certificate, I always ask what his motive is. The most common mention is inheritance, that they got a weapon from someone through the division of property. I rarely hear them mention security and sports activities, i.e. hunting," says Vuković.

He points out that it happens that their institution does not issue a certificate, but a private one does so later.

"We issue a medical certificate that the candidate is unfit, and he goes to another health facility. I must say most often to a private one, but it also happens in public ones, and he receives a medical certificate. Imagine the situation we are in," says Vuković.

Marković adds yes number of issued weapons licenses did not increase significantly compared to previous years.

"There are often narratives that the wartime environment affected this amount of weapons... Are they being procured illegally, yes. They are being procured via the dark web, printing via 3D printers... There is a directorate in the Ministry of Economic Development and Tourism that deals with issuing permits for export and import of weapons, one super team that does control to the end user," he states.

Answering the question of what Montenegrin regulation is like, Marković says that our law is not only harmonized with the European law, but also stricter.

"What was a certain trend of thinking was whether a citizen needs a medical certificate. If we had a built health system and my chosen doctor had the knowledge in the record that I contracted an illness and had psychological changes and informed the MUP, then a medical certificate would be unnecessary." Marković believes.

Popović is of the opinion that the validity of the armed list of 10 years is too much.

"Amendments to the law are in the parliamentary procedure and I think that they will go for shortening, so that the term will be five years".

And Vuković states that there is an urgent need to network the data of the MUP and the Ministry of Health.

"To gather data on issued medical certificates in one place, so if we make a decision that he is not fit to carry weapons, drive, then if a person shows up with a certificate from another institution, it can be seen that something is wrong".