CHICAGO, Oct. 22 (UPI) -- An Illinois congressman plans to reintroduce legislation to ban private ownership of the military's most powerful rifle, a .50-caliber sniper weapon that can fire a bullet more than 4 miles, piercing tank armor, concrete bunkers and bulletproof glass, according to reports Monday.
Rep. Rod Blagojevich, D-Ill., a candidate for Illinois governor, said the world has changed and there's no reason for civilians to own rifles that are "ideal tools for assassination and terrorism."
The long-range military sniper rifles were designed for use during the Persian Gulf War. Suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden's al Qaida group reportedly may have at least two dozen of the Barrett rifles.
The Washington-based Violence Policy Center, a national gun control group, said in a study Afghan fighters received 25 of the military sniper rifles in the late 1980s, just months before the end of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, and presumably still have them.
"You can conceivably fire one of these weapons from the John Hancock building and hit the right field bleachers at Wrigley Field," Blagojevich told a Sunday news conference. "It poses a tremendous threat to commercial aviation travel. It also poses an obvious threat to even the president of the United States."
Blagojevich, who sponsored a bill to ban the rifle in 1999, held up a more than 5-inch-long sniper cartridge for reporters. He said the rifles and armor-piercing ammunition could be purchased at gun shops and on the Internet more easily than a handgun.
"There is no legitimate civilian purpose for this gun," he said, adding the Congressional General Accounting Office had traced the rifles to "suspected terrorist groups, drug cartels, a doomsday cult in Montana, a white supremacist group in Louisiana and a mentally ill cop killer in Michigan."
"These arms were designed by the military and should be left to the military," he said.
The Illinois State Rifle Association, which represents 1.5 million gun owners, Monday, issued a statement accusing Blagojevich of fear-mongering against lawful firearm ownership for political purposes.
"Blagojevich warned fans of the Chicago Cubs that they could soon become targets for terrorist snipers firing at them from the roof of the Sears Tower," the group said. "The truth of the matter is that Cub fans have a lot more to fear from the paroled habitual felon than they do from the prospect of a terrorist lugging a 30 pound, 5-foot-long rifle up 110 flights of stairs to the roof of the Sears Tower."
