CORK CITY Council officials are to be asked to introduce bylaws banning the sale of samurai swords in the city following a recent attack on a man who required stitches after being attacked by two people wielding swords.
Samurai swords can be purchased in at least two shops in Cork with prices starting at about €100 and shop assistants are not breaking the law by selling them to people of any age. They can also be purchased on the internet for less than €50.
Last Wednesday a 24-year-old man was assaulted by two men armed with samurai swords outside a house at Maiville Terrace, Turner's Cross in Cork city. The man was treated at the South Infirmary Hospital for a gaping head wound.
The sale of samurai swords is legal but last December, following a spate of attacks involving the weapons nationally, Fine Gael proposed a change to the Firearms and Offensive Weapons Act of 1990, to include a ban on their sale, possession or importation.
However, there is a general acceptance that there is a special case for exemptions for genuine collectors of the original weapons.
Now former Cork lord mayor Cllr Joe O'Callaghan is planning to ask Cork City Council to become the first local authority to introduce a bylaw to prohibit the sale of samurai swords in the city. He says he is "very concerned" about the open sale of the weapons in Cork insisting they can be "lethal" in the wrong hands.
"I will be talking to city officials to see if we can introduce a bylaw to stop the sale of these dangerous weapons which can cause injury or death. Samurai swords should not be on sale when there is an ever growing use of knives. Savage injuries can be caused. There should be no tolerance from the law for people caught using swords in a barbaric fashion," he said.
Last January a 27-year-old man from Ballymun in Dublin had to undergo surgery to reattach one of his hands which was severed in a sword attack. An eyewitness to the Finglas attack told gardaí that the victim's hand "fell to the ground like a glove" after it was cut off when one of his attackers swung a samurai sword at him.
Last December two gardaí were chased by a man wielding a samurai sword at an apartment complex in Dublin city centre.
Also in December in Cork, a 21-year-old man received slash wounds when he was attacked by a man with a samurai sword. He received treatment at Cork University Hospital.
In another incident earlier last December, a 24-year-old man threatened firefighters with a samurai sword in Dundalk. The firefighters had to turn a water hose on the man after he approached them wielding the weapon.