Or Venezuela. As part of consolidating power, often authoritarian governments implement an arms buyback or confiscation program to minimize armed uprising later on.
I like the Orwellian term “buy back” as if you purchased arms from them in the first place, and secondly they’re using your money to deprive you. For the small arms nay sayers (against a well equipped military) case in point is Afghanistan, guerrillas wore down the Soviets.
How do you think it would be going if Hong Kong has gun ownership at the level of the US?