Bermuda should be able to roll out its own Operation CeaseFire by April or May and may even have a national summit on gangs in 2012, National Security Minister Wayne Perinchief has revealed.He told The Royal Gazette he was convinced his Ministry and the Inter-Agency Gang Taskforce set up in November 2010 were now on the right track to target gun crime.“This is not a passing phenomenon,” he said of the violence which has left 16 men dead since May 2009. “This is definitely gang warfare. There are well-defined gangs. They are not just neighbourhood posses.”Mr Perinchief said it was only in 2009 that Government recognised the scale of Bermuda’s gang problem and began to seriously address it, including bringing in legislation such as extended stop and search powers for police.He acknowledged that 12 of the 16 murders in the last two-and-a-half years remained unsolved but said police were making swift arrests after every shooting, giving a “greater level of comfort” to the public.“The arrest rate has been phenomenal,” he said. “What that does, that stops the flow of any organised gang to run rampant unabated.“It’s not a high conviction rate [for murder] but there is a high rate of arrest, which is important. Of those that have not yet come to court, they are under active investigation.“These are not cold cases. They are all part of a series of murders. There is a team of officers from the UK and Bermuda actively working on these cases.“I happen to know that at least some of them are coming to a point where they are needing specific bits of evidence. That’s where the confidence level comes in.”The Minister said he’d been doing a lot of “off the record meeting” with alleged gang members since he was appointed to Cabinet in April, after Mr Burch resigned.“People who were involved in gang activity reached out to me,” he said. “Behind the scenes, independently, I have been speaking to people.”Mr Perinchief, a former Assistant Police Commissioner, said he’d encouraged older people close to the gangs to exert their influence and help quell the violence.“It’s been very beneficial,” said the Pembroke Central MP. “What I will say is that there have been fewer gang murders, gang slayings, since May. What I think is still going on is perhaps we have members of those gangs still trying to, if you like, make their mark or whatever.”He said he suspected recent firearm incidents were the work of low-level gang members who’d managed to get hold of guns.The Minister added that the biggest task was to prevent more murders, adding: “We are getting pretty good at that.”He said he was convinced Operation CeaseFire, an anti-gang initiative which has proved successful in several US cities, could work for Bermuda.Having visited the States earlier this month to find out more, he wants to combine it with elements of Boston’s StreetSafe scheme, which uses neighbourhood case workers to identify and target those at risk of a violent lifestyle.The hope is to have an adapted Ceasefire programme ready to roll out by April or May, using local gang mediators and the Ministry’s existing budget.Mr Perinchief, speaking with this newspaper on December 13, said Bermuda had enough talent to create its own programme, based on the successful formula, with minimal need for overseas experts. He added: “People will be accepting of a local face.”He said of the US-based CeaseFire: “They have invited us to pull on their resources. Should we get to a point where we have stalled and can’t get it moving, we’ll call on their resources and ask them to come and help us.“Operation Ceasefire will morph or change in every environment that it is placed. We’ll use the existing organisations that we have under the Ceasefire template.”The Minister said he hoped the scheme could eventually become a public-private partnership, meaning it would be funded by Government and other organisations.He added in a statement yesterday that potential gang mediators on the Island had been identified and a means by which to bring willing players to the table would be in train early next month.“Successful mediation efforts are best led through private sector activity and not necessarily through Government-sponsored programmes, but this Government cannot wait for that leadership to start this important work.“Concurrently we will pursue a non-Government entity to support the gang mediation activity but in the meantime we are committed to action.”The idea of a peace summit was promised by former Public Safety Minister David Burch as far back as May 2009.The event never took place and Mr Perinchief told this newspaper he was making no promises for next year but his Ministry was looking to make a national summit happen.He said every MP in the House of Assembly had been touched by gang violence and everyone in Government knew someone affected.“This touches everybody,” said Mr Perinchief. “This is very up close and personal to all of us. If any government can fix it, we can fix it. We are personally involved. We have got to be empathetic because we are the people.“This is not some government that’s like a political overlay on the society. This is us. We are the gangs.”