Education World

Yemen’s Interior Ministry made orders on Sunday to enforce a ban on carrying weapons in the capital Sanaa.

“The resolution on banning carrying weapons in the capital Sanaa must be applied to everyone alike, without exception,” the ministry said in a statement directed to the police and security agencies.

The campaign, which is part of a nationwide anti-arms-carry campaign launched in late 2007, targets all entrances of roads leading to the capital as it authorized security checkpoints to confiscate any piece of arms seized during inspection.

The ministry’s resolution also bans carrying arms during wedding ceremonies in the neighborhoods of Sanaa, despite that bearing firearms during marriages are considered as a main traditional part of the Yemeni custom.

Meanwhile, searching for wanted people and arresting them in Sanaa will also be included in the campaign, said the statement.

Yemeni police have confiscated more than 79,000 firearms in Sanaa and other major cities across the country since August 2007, according to Defense Ministry’s website 26sep.net.

Local reports said that almost all Yemeni families have ammunition as the country’s 21 million population own a total of more than 60 million pieces of firearms with no lack of heavy machine-guns and rocket launchers.

Yemen, described as a place of happiness in ancient books, is now one of the world’s most underdeveloped countries with persistent high levels of poverty, unemployment rate and illiteracy, and the kind of soil for terrorism, which is annoying the country.

Analysts stress that only by combining anti-terrorism efforts with economic development, poverty relief and improved educational levels can Yemen eliminate terrorism in its territory and bring back the title of the place of happiness.