In this episode, we interview a small arms collector in Pakistan, Mr Ali. Ali has vast experience in the small arms market of Pakistan and was willing to share his knowledge on how it operates, the availability of certain weaponry and the price ranges, as well as the legal regulations and laws that are getting stricter in Pakistan.
He also runs an Instagram page, guns_pakistan, which shows his collection of armament and that of dealers he knows. Do check it out, you will not regret it.
The public SoundCloud version below includes the first thirty minutes of the podcast, our supporters on Patreon can access the entire interview, which is over an hour long. So if you haven’t already please support us in our mission to bring you the best examination of MENA small arms culture we can!
https://soundcloud.com/silah-report/v25-ali-the-gun-collector-in-pakistan
Podcast Running Order:
Presentations:
How the Collection began
Licenses and the Strict Gun Laws of Pakistan
The Various Sources of Armaments
How the Collection began
Ali was influenced by action movies made in the eighties and although no one in his family was into weapons, he developed a great interest in guns. Ali’s first firearm was a gift, a 9×19mm Glock 17 pistol, which piqued his interest as he had researched the pistol online, reading articles and watching videos about it. The second firearm he owned was an Uzi 9×19mm submachine, originally sold to the Shah’s regime in Iran before the Islamic revolution of 1979. Ali spent ten years building trust and connections with arms dealers to gain access to the most exotic and incredible variety of small arms in the country.
Fig. 1.1. This Israeli-made Uzi 9×19mm submachine gun sold to Iran during the Shah’s reign has found its way onto the Pakistani market (Source: Ali’s Instagram page – guns_pakistan)
Licenses and the Strict Gun Laws of Pakistan
Ali brought to our attention the strict gun laws in Pakistan and how over the last seven or eight years firearm laws have become ever-stricter. He mentioned the different licenses you need to own a specific kind of a firearm. For example, you need a completely different license to own a revolver than to own a shotgun. Certain “big calibers”, which rifle rounds like 7.62×39mm fall under, require getting a special kind of license that is extremely difficult to attain but given that Pakistan is a tribal nation and the tribes take pride in their armament, almost every household will have a number of firearms which mostly are of an illegal nature but the government turns a blind eye as long as they are kept within the property of the owner.
Ali also explained that due to the War on Terror that Pakistan is fighting, border security has become a very serious matter, especially with Afghanistan. The flow of weapons and ammunition into Pakistan from Afghanistan used to be very significant. At the present time, however, due to the recently implemented regulations and security protocols, the smuggling firearms has become incredibly difficult. Historically, the Taliban in Afghanistan would use American/ Western-made weapons for photo ops and then, later on, sell it on the black market to fetch quite the sum of money while the weapon would be smuggled into Pakistan.
Fig 2.1. PS90, according to Ali, just two examples exist in Pakistan, making this one of the rarest weapons on the market (Source: guns_pakistan)
Fig 2.2. A Mavoric ALT-12 shotgun painted gold and available in Pakistan. Many Turkish shotguns are available in Pakistan and Afghanistan (Source: guns_pakistan)
The Various Sources of Armaments
Ali spoke in-depth on the various sources for guns in the country, one of the sources is weapons captured from the Taliban or other insurgent groups by the Pakistani military which end up on the black market. Another source he mentioned was obviously smuggled weapons coming from Afghanistan, whether it was weapons captured from Afghani security forces or stolen from their armories via corrupt officials. Ali spoke in more detail about the sources in the full version of the interview which is available on Patreon.
We would like to thank Ali for his time and would love to have back with us again and enlighten us more about Pakistani gun culture!
If you missed our previous episode, you can find it here and you can browse all of our previous episodes here!
Patreon Shoutout
If you want to support our work on researching small arms and light weapons in the MENA and Central Asian regions, please consider joining our Patreon support network that allows us to get articles, videos, and podcasts such as these to an international audience. Check us out at www.patreon.com/SilahReport.
Would love to collect a few from Pakistan.