The National Commission on Small Arms and Light Weapons has revealed that around 1.1 million small arms and light weapons within the country cannot be adequately traced or documented.

This staggering number of unaccounted-for weapons, out of a total of 2.3 million currently circulating, poses a grave threat to national security, according to the Commission.

Frank Boateng Asumani, the Head of the National Arms Marking Programme at the Commission, highlighted ongoing endeavours to mitigate the proliferation of these arms during a regional conference addressing the humanitarian impact of improvised anti-personnel mines.

“Currently, we have 2.3 million small and light weapons in circulation, out of which 1.2 million are legally registered and the remaining 1.1 million cannot be accounted for and so the Commission is currently looking for funding to know the level of proliferation we have in the system. We are talking about AK47s, pistols, pump-action guns, and locally manufactured guns.”