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US has to ban automatic weapons to avoid further mass shootings: Author

Monday, 02 October 2017 7:14 PM [ Last Update: Monday, 02 October 2017 7:35 PM ]

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The United States needs to ban automatic weapons used in war for mass killings in order to avoid the deadly incidents like the one at a Los Vegas music concert on Sunday night, an American author and investigative journalist says.

Dave Lindorff, a columnist for Counter Punch and a contributor to Business Week and other news organizations, made the remarks in an interview with Press TV on Monday, after a heavily armed gunman went on a shooting spree on the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino. The attack left at least 58 people dead and injured more than 500 others.

Police said the suspect, identified as 64-year-old white male Stephen Paddock from Mesquite, shot himself to death. According to reports, the shooter fired from multiple automatic weapons at the people attending the country music concert.

PressTV-58 dead, 500 injured in Las Vegas mass shooting

A gunman has opened fire on a music concert in what is said to be the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.

Lindorff said, “It’s the worst mass shooting in history, I think. It’s going to jar a lot of people who are sort of national rifle association types, you know, gun rights types. And it’s going to raise questions at least about the availability of automatic weapons, because here is a guy who actually was using machine guns that were firing rapid bursts of bullets."

“There’s no other way to kill or injure that many people without an automatic weapon or multiple automatic weapons,” he added.

“This is really a weapon that’s used in war for the mass killing. It has no other purpose except for the capability of the mass killing,” the analyst said.

“And, I would point out that, according to Newsweek, Nevada has some of the most relaxed gun laws in the country. They don’t outlaw automatic weapons. They don’t require people to have licenses for their guns or register their guns,” he noted.

“They don’t restrict the resale of their guns to other people. There is no monitoring any of that. So obtaining these things including machine guns is completely not only legal but easy, and untraceable,” he said.

“So it assisted in inviting this kind of horror to happen. And I think at this point it’s going to shock people into maybe doing something about that, not about the general issue of massive gun ownership in the United States but of the automatic weapons,” the commentator concluded.

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