Colombia's new president loosens gun control rules
President Abelardo de la Espriella has lifted a decade-long suspension on permits to carry legal firearms.
Colombia's new president relaxes gun control rules
Abelardo de la Espriella won the presidential election in June on a promise to be tough on crime
Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella has signed a decree easing restrictions on carrying legal firearms in public.
De la Espriella, who during his presidential campaign pledged an iron-fist response to crime, said it was "not right that criminals are armed to the teeth while decent people can't defend themselves".
The decree ends a suspension that had been in place for a decade, under which even people with permits to carry guns were unable to do so without extra authorisation.
De la Espriella said the decree would not amount to a free-for-all and that strict controls over who can own a gun would stay in force.
When signing the decree, the president said he had fulfilled a campaign pledge: "A man's word is his honour, and I have honour, that's why I keep my word."
The ban on carrying legal guns in public was introduced by then-President Juan Manuel Santos in December 2015. It was originally intended as a temporary step to improve security during the Christmas and New Year period.
However, Santos and two later presidents from opposite ends of the political spectrum — conservative Iván Duque and left-wing Gustavo Petro — renewed the suspension every year.
Under the law, even permit holders could not remove a gun from their homes unless they applied for - and received - additional authorisation.
De la Espriella said his decree had lifted a restriction that was never meant to be permanent.
Spanish newspaper El País reported that the decree will affect almost 700,000 people in Colombia who already hold a legal permit to carry a gun.
They will now be allowed to take their registered gun out of their home, as long as their permits are still valid.
Green Alliance Party Senator Ariel Ávila called the move a "grave error", saying legally held guns would end up in criminals' hands.
Ávila said it raised an ethical dilemma, because only state forces should carry guns and serve as guarantors of people's security.
De la Espriella said the measure would not harm security in the country and said forces were going after people carrying illegal guns and had seized more than 15,000 firearms so far this year.
Most of them, according to de la Espriella, belonged to members of breakaway factions of the Farc rebel group and the Gulf Clan criminal gang.