There are about 20 registered guns, including pistols and machineguns, for every 100 people in Malta, according to statistics released in Parliament.
In all, there are about 90,000 weapons registered, including some 12,400 pistols, excluding those owned by the police force.
Among the registered firearms are 52,224 shotguns and 8,373 airguns. The number of registered pistols, revolvers, rifles, machineguns and sub-machineguns reaches a staggering 17,036.
The statistics were given by Home Affairs Minister Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici in reply to a parliamentary question by Labour MP Gino Cauchi, in the wake of a spate of publicised gun crime.
There was a series of armed hold-ups but the more recent prominent cases involved a murder in which Neville Baldacchino, 28, was shot dead in Qormi and the incident when Carmel Saliba, 31, allegedly shot at the Mqabba Nationalist Party club in full view of police. He was charged with the attempted murder of 20 people.
Still, gun activist and expert Stephen Petroni was adamant that the number of available firearms was not a safety hazard.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090305/local/20-guns-for-every-100-people