Swiss Senate rejects soldiers taking home ammunition

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The Swiss Senate does not believe the current threat situation justifies allowing soldiers to take so-called 'pocket' amounts of ammunition home with them.

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The Senate rejected a motion by Swiss People’s Party parliamentarian Werner Salzmann by 31 votes to 9 with 3 abstentions. For the majority, a return of pocket ammunition could wipe out progress made in recent years in preventing suicides and feminicides by firearms.

The vote result contradicts a Senate committee that recommended the storage of ammunition at home. According to the author of the motion, the time has come to go back on the 2007 decision, in which the gaovernment ordered the withdrawal of pocket ammunition while promising to review the situation if circumstances change.

For Salzmann, the circumstances have changed significantly in the meantime, and public awareness needs to be raised.

The handing over of pocket ammunition to the military would strengthen their security in the event of mobilisation and more generally the defence capability of the army, he said.

Currently, the army carries out a careful psychological examination of future soldiers, discarding those who are unsuitable. Therefore, according to Salzmann, the distribution of pocket ammunition will have no impact on the number of murders and suicides committed with the service weapon.

But other Senators said that numerous Swiss studies show that the number of suicides and criminal acts with service weapons has fallen since the ban on taking ammunition home.

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A return to the past would undo such progress, according to the camp opposing the motion, and open the way for further dramas, especially family dramas, that could be avoided.

Several speakers went on to point out that the current threat level to Switzerland is not such that it is necessary to hand over ammunition to soldiers. In the event of mobilisation, the army will undoubtedly be able to mobilise in good time.

Defence minister Martin Pfister believes the ban on taking ammunition home does not undermine the state’s trust in soldiers, pointing out that they are allowed to keep their service weapons at home.

Translated from Italian by DeepL/mga

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