Following the latest school shooting to rock the US, President Obama has said all Americans are answerable for gun crime in America which has become routine. We have become numb to this, he said in an powerful address.
Responding to the massacre at Umpqua Community College in the US state of Oregon which has left at least 10 people dead and seven injured, in a stern statement, speaking from the White House, the President said: Our thoughts and prayers are not enough. Its not enough. It does not capture the anger and grief we should feel and does nothing to stop this carnage ... (happening again) next week or a couple of months from now.
Listing the recent gun massacres in the US he said the reporting of gun crime has become routine as has the response of those who oppose gun controls in the US.
Somehow this has become routine. The reporting is routine, my response here at this podium ends up being routine. It cannot be this easy for someone who wants to inflict harm on other people to get a gun. We collectively are answerable to those families because of our inaction.
The president highlighted the disparity between incidences of mass shootings in the US and the rest of the world. We are the only advanced country on earth that sees these kinds of mass shootings every few months, he said.
Anyone who does this has a sickness in their minds, regardless of what they think their motivations may be. We are not the only country on earth who has people with mental illnesses ... We are the only country on earth who sees these kind of mass shootings every month.
There is a gun for roughly every man, woman and child in America ... Other countries in response to one mass shooting have enacted laws that eliminate mass shootings. Allies of ours - Great Britain, Australia ... countries like ours. We know there are ways of preventing it.
He appealed to news organisations to tally up the numbers of Americans killed in terror attacks in the last decade to those killed in mass shootings to highlight the issue and called for a change in politics.
This is a political choice that we make. To allow this to happen every few months in America. We are going to have to change our laws. This is not something I can do by myself. I need to have congress and state legislatures and governors who are willing to work with me on this.
Offering his condolences to those who have lost members of their family in the Oregon tragedy he said he hoped that he would not have to make another statement following a shooting during his last term as president.
The investigation into the latest shooting is still active. Following a press conference it was confirmed that the unidentified gunman was killed in an exchange of gunfire with police.
