Trudeau cracks down on handguns with new gun control bill

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on Monday the introduction of Bill C-21 to strengthen the country's gun control policies.

"One Canadian killed by gun violence is one too many. I've seen all too well the tragic cost that gun violence has in our communities across the country. Today, we're proposing some of the strongest measures in Canadian history to keep guns out of our communities and build a safer future for everyone," Trudeau said.

According to The Washington Post, the new legislation would "implement a 'national freeze' on buying, importing, transferring, and selling handguns." It will also increase criminal penalties for gun trafficking and create a red flag law that would "enable courts to require that individuals considered a danger to themselves or others surrender their firearms to law enforcement," Trudeau's office said in a press release.

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Canada previously banned over 1,500 types of assault-style weapons in 2020 after a gunman killed 22 people in Nova Scotia.

In 2018, 695 Canadians were killed by firearms, a rate of 1.94 people per 100,000. In the United States, the rate of gun deaths was 12.09 per 100,000.