President Leonel Fernandez is worried about the quantity of firearms in the possession of the civilian population, and has asked his Minister of the Interior and Police, Franklin Almeyda, to start an educational campaign aimed at creating awareness about the implications of possessing a firearm. The President said that he was fully aware of the large number of permit holders who are not able to use their weapons properly. The chief executive also urged the police to eliminate the so-called “exchange of fire” which appears to be a police euphemism for the summary execution of criminals. According to the President, even the worst criminal in the world deserves to be tried in the courts. The President was speaking yesterday evening during his TV program “The Presidential Agenda”, after Almeyda related all the cases of children affected by stray bullets. Attorney General Francisco Dominguez Brito and the new Police Chief, general Bernardo Santana Paez were also on the show, and Dominguez Brito described how drugs, drug trafficking and the fight for drug territory were all related to the violence. With the police chief on his right-hand side, the President reported on a government survey, taken in the barrios of Las Canitas and Gualey, that revealed that the common people do not trust the police, and he added that the Dominican police are more repressive than preventive in their fight against crime. As reported in El Caribe, the President, towards the end of his remarks, emphasized the need to give greater attention to the family, because “after all, it is within the family that human beings begin to develop and to acquire their first values.”