When I hunted in Finland it was with a group of both American and European gun writers. One was from France, and among others he owned close to 50 rifles, some of them semi-autos, and several semi-auto handguns.
Curious to know if your acquaintance from France had some kind of special privilege or if it is common (feasible) for a typical French citizen to own firearms like your acquaintance.
No, the only "regulation" for a citizen had to buy a firearm in France was to have a hunting license or a shooting sport license, depending depending on the type, function and magazine capacity of the weapon. (But there is no "right to bear arms.")
From the research I've done since, apparently that hasn't changed much, despite the Paris incident--which happened shortly after our hunt. Instead the biggest problem in France is a major increase in the number of illegal arms, which are apparently smuggled across one part of their border.
