Nationwide blitz on illegal firearms under Operation Unification Some of the weapons, including rifles and shotguns, that were seized by police officers carrying out a raid on an Enfield house last week. Picture: GREG HIGGSth Source: adelaidenow POLICE will launch an unprecedented national crackdown on illegal firearms and their suppliers in the first Australia-wide assault on gun violence. The two-week blitz, called Operation Unification, will start tomorrow when hundreds of police around the country will be on stand-by to follow up tips from the public. Under the operation, police are appealing to the community - as well as criminals - to call the Crime Stoppers hotline with information on illegal guns. Police want to remove them from the streets and obtain information on the importation and manufacture of illicit firearms. The blitz mirrors a South Australian operation that has resulted in the seizure of more than 100 guns since it began in March. Police will also use the national blitz to share information across jurisdictions. "Their information will increase our intelligence and informationsharing across policing jurisdictions about firearms and associated organised crime groups," said SA Police Assistant Commissioner (Crime) Paul Dickson. Police will act on information from anyone who has knowledge of illicit firearms and we hope to increase the recovery of illegal or stolen firearms and prosecute the individuals involved. All police jurisdictions are targeting the same group of people and, hopefully, from that we will get some good intelligence that we will be able to operate from to apprehend people who are manufacturing (or) trafficking from one area to another. Victoria Police Assistant Commissioner Steve Fontana said those who helped police could potentially "save the lives of others." He said information given to police would be acted upon and the issue of illegal firearms would be a key element at today's meeting in Melbourne of the Australia New Zealand Policing Advisory Agency. Mr Fontana said investigators were increasingly concerned at a trend that has seen criminals making their own guns, and the risk to the broader community from criminals shooting at each other. He added that police also were concerned about an increase in the number of guns being found by officers on routine patrols, widespread thefts of firearms from rural properties and a failure among some legitimate gun-owners to properly secure their weapons. Mr Dickson said Operation Unification complemented initiatives in SA that had removed almost 3000 firearms from the community over the past nine months - including 2783 firearms handed in during a three-month gun amnesty and those seized by police. In March, police launched their latest initiative, Operation Disarm, which has so far resulted in 109 illegal firearms being seized from criminals - including military-style SKS machine guns, pump-action shotguns, high-powered rifles and high-calibre handguns. While police are offering cash rewards for information as part of Operation Disarm, Mr Dickson revealed that just one reward of $1000 had been paid to date because those providing information were not requesting payment. He said officers had received valuable information from within the firearms community - and from criminals themselves. "People are telling us they are aware of individuals who are dealing in firearms, or ... they know of someone who has an illegal weapon," Mr Dickson said. He added: "And criminals are dobbing in other criminals. If they can sort them out - for whatever reason - they will. Police have launched 164 investigations as a direct result of the information received during Operation Disarm - including several long-term investigations into allegations of firearms manufacture. Mr Dickson said investigators believed most of the higher-end weapons seized during the operation were coming from the so-called "grey" market - a pool of unregistered firearms that remained in the possession of those who failed to surrender them in the 1996 firearms buyback. Many were kept by their owners but had subsequently been stolen by criminals in targeted break-ins. Anyone with information on illicit firearms in the community - including those in the criminal underworld - are urged to contact police on the Crime Stoppers' hotline, 1800 333 000, during Operation Unification. A report released last year by the Australian Institute of Criminology said there were about 1545 firearms reported stolen each year across the country and, of those, only about 10 per cent were recovered. And the Australian Crime Commission estimates there are more than 250,000 rifles and shotguns and 10,000 handguns circulating in the illicit firearms market across the nation.