‘Don’t treat gun violence as routine tragedy’

President Barack Obama made an impassioned plea on Sunday for Americans to overcome their ‘creeping resignation’ about gun violence and demand tougher gun laws following the country’s latest mass shooting.

‘I’m here to say there’s nothing routine about this tragedy. There’s nothing routine about your loss,’ Obama told families at a memorial service for the 12 persons killed by a gunman last week at the Washington Navy Yard.

‘Sometimes I fear there is a creeping resignation that these tragedies are just somehow the way it is,’ he said at the outdoor service at Marine Barracks Washington, less than three blocks from the base where three women and nine men died in the attack.

‘We must insist here Monday there is nothing normal about innocent men and women being gunned down where they work,’ Obama said.

Authorities have identified the shooter as Aaron Alexis, 34, a former US navy reservist working as an information technology contractor. He was killed in the ensuing gun battle with police. There were signs that Alexis had untreated mental health issues. Rhode Island police had warned the navy in August that Alexis had reported ‘hearing voices’ and said he believed people were following him and ‘sending vibrations into his body.’

Obama said the military needs to do more to secure its facilities, and said US must also make mental health treatment more available. But he also railed against lax gun laws that he blamed for murder rates in US which are three times higher than other developed nations. ‘No other advanced nation endures this kind of violence. None. What’s different in America is it’s easy to get your hands on a gun,’ he said.

Before the service, Obama and first lady Michelle Obama met privately with families of the victims, all civilians who worked at the complex not far from Capitol Hill.