Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul suspended the issuance of permits to buy firearms and said existing licences would be reviewed, days after a 14-year-old gunman killed nine people.
Anutin directed a deputy prime minister overseeing legal affairs to expedite a new gun control law, with stronger controls and significantly harsher penalties.
Police were ordered to stop renewing permits that enable people to buy firearms.
Registered firearms must be kept at home and cannot be carried in public, Anutin said yesterday, reiterating the current law.
For illegal firearms, studies are underway to enact legislation requiring their return to the state within a specified period, he added.
Last week, a teenage student killed six people and himself at a school outside Bangkok after fatally shooting his grandparents in the South-East Asian nation’s worst mass killing in nearly four years.
Days later, former lawmaker Chalong Riewrang shot and killed a Thai official inside a government office on the outskirts of the capital, following a dispute over borrowed money.
Thailand had an estimated 10.3 million firearms in civilian possession, equating to around 15 guns per 100 residents, the highest rate in the region by a wide margin, according to a 2017 estimate by the Small Arms Survey.
Yesterday, the white caskets of the couple killed by their grandson were laid out at the Tem Rak Samakkhi Buddhist temple, alongside their portraits, ahead of their cremation capping a funeral lasting several days.
The boy’s smaller casket was placed to the side at the same temple, surrounded by white flowers.
Among the mourners was Tawee Piewphong, who paid tribute to his brother-in-law – the grandfather – as “a man of few words, but a very kind person”.
Speaking to AFP, Tawee expressed shock at the killings, saying he had no idea what motivated the teenager – but also offering compassion.
“I want to tell him that being 14 is just a small fraction of your entire life, and every problem has a solution. Not everything is the end of the world,” he said.
The 70-year-old suggested the boy may have killed his grandparents “so they would not be responsible for the actions he was going to take at school later”.
Ajima, who asked that her surname be withheld for privacy reasons, said she was a relative of the boy and felt deeply sorry for him.
“A boy at that age is like a blank piece of fabric. He must have gone through a lot of issues, but nobody knows why he resorted to shooting as a solution. I feel terribly sorry for him,” she said.
Investigators are still seeking a motive for the shooting, but police said on Sunday the boy had watched violent videos online and once brought a BB gun to school.
“I feel really sorry for the boy,” said Somjai Poosod, whose grandchildren attend the school attacked, one of whom was a friend of the shooter.
“Of course I feel bad for the innocent people who were killed, but I feel there is an issue of mental health that we may need to address to prevent incidents like this from happening again,” she added. — Reuters/AFP
