A total of 3,028 people were killed and 20,324 were injured in incidents of gun violence in Turkey between 2016 and 2018, according to the Interior Ministry, the Hürriyet Daily News reported.
Incidents of gun violence are defined as instances in which people were deliberately killed or injured with a gun. The numbers from the Interior Ministry exclude suicides.
Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu cited the figures in response to a parliamentary question from Ömer Fethi Gürer, a lawmaker with the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).
In total 273,447 gun licenses had been issued to civilians as of November 2018. Police confiscated 25,951 unlicensed guns between 2016 and 2018, Soylu added.
Meanwhile, shooting into the air during celebrations causes dozens of accidental deaths and hundreds of injuries.
“Between Jan. 1, 2017 and Sept. 1, 2018, 35 people were killed in incidents that involved random shooting into the air, while 600 were injured,” said Soylu, adding that of the 35, 10 were children, and of the 600, 311 were children.