Word: gunness
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...dissident republicans opposed to power sharing now pose a greater security threat than at any time in the past six years. On Jan. 8, a Catholic police officer was critically injured when a bomb exploded under his car in County Antrim. And in November, another police officer survived a gun attack by suspected dissidents in County Fermanagh. Many fear that a political collapse could play into the dissidents' hands - and bring more violence. "A lot depends on the next few days in relation to progress on policing and justice," says Michael Graham, a political-history professor at Queen's University...
...long been the ultimate political tool for eliminating rivals to steal a win at the polls. "This is especially so at the level of local rather than national politics," says Benito Lim, a political science professor at the University of the Philippines, who believes the baleful tradition of "guns, goons and gold" at elections will be hard to uproot. Still, Comelec, the national election commission, hopes the tough gun ban (the early arrests have been widely publicized in the local media) will reduce the potential for violence in the run-up to the polls, along with the efforts...
...Gun bans are always rolled out general and mid-term elections in the Philippines, held every six and three years, respectively. The past three elections have each seen around 120 killings of candidates, supporters and Comelec officials, and around 250 violent incidents...
...hapless cop was reportedly stopped at a police checkpoint in the capital region's Quezon City just 30 minutes into the gun ban that began on Jan. 10. In the first 48 hours of the clampdown, 71 people were arrested at police checkpoints across the country for carrying firearms. Many of those nabbed pleaded ignorance, but the authorities have vowed zero tolerance for violators of the ban that suspends licenses to carry firearms in public - and there are over 1 million registered handguns and rifles in the Philippines - until June 9, the last day of the official election period after...
...Opponents of the gun ban, however, say it only puts candidates at further risk. "No amount of gun bans will stop the bad guys from using firearms to eliminate rivals. The good guys should be allowed to protect themselves," says Richard Gordon, a serving Senator and presidential candidate, whose father was assassinated in the early years of the Marcos dictatorship. With candidates staking so much money and personal prestige on winning, the only way to make elections less violent is to reduce the giddy costs of campaigning and encourage a less vitriolic debate among rivals, says Gordon...