彈弓使得好也可以當武器，但是你聽說過警員不配槍，配彈弓的嗎？墨西哥阿爾瓦拉多市的警員不得不用彈弓來打擊犯罪，因為沒有槍。
Photo: Alvarado municipal governmentPolice officers in the Mexican town of Alvarado were recently stripped of their firearms and armed with slingshots and rocks instead, after most of them failed their control tests and were deemed unfit for service.
墨西哥阿爾瓦拉多市的警員最近被解除了配槍，代之以彈弓和石子。原因是他們中的大多數人沒通過自控力測試，被認為不適合執行公務。
After only 30 officers of the 130-member police department in Alvarado managed to pass their control tests for the use of firearms, Miguel Ángel Yunes Linares, governor of the Mexican state of Verracruz, decided to strip the entire department of firearms.
阿爾瓦拉多市警察局的130名警員中只有30名通過了使用槍械的自控力測試，墨西哥韋拉克魯斯州州長米格爾•安赫爾•尤尼斯•利納雷斯決定解除整個警察局的武器裝備。
The governor’s office has confirmed that similar actions have been taken in other municipalities. However, some local officials have accused Yunes Linares of stripping local law enforcement of what little protection they had against the criminal organisations in Verracruz. In Alvarado, the officers were armed with slingshots and rocks.
州長辦公室已證實，其他城市也採取過類似的措施。但是，當地的一些官員指責尤尼斯•利納雷斯將當地執法機關對抗韋拉克魯斯州犯罪組織非常有限的防衛工具給剝奪了。於是，阿爾瓦拉多市給警員們配備了彈弓和石子。
Bogar Ruiz Rosas, the mayor of Alvarado, protested the decision to have his local police force disarmed by organizing a symbolic handover event where he issued police their new sidearms – slingshots and rocks. During this event, Rosas argued that most of those officers who failed their control tests did so because the department is currently made up of mostly newly recruited officers.
阿爾瓦拉多市市長伯葛•魯伊斯•羅薩斯在發給警察新“武器”——彈弓和石子時還組織了一個象徵性的交接儀式，以抗議州長解除本市警察武裝的決定。在儀式上，羅薩斯表示，大多數警員沒能通過自控力測試是因為目前警局內大多是新招進來的員工。
Photo: Alvarado municipal government"Today we delivered slingshots to our municipal police,” the mayor told reporters present at the handover event. “The citizen governor made the decision to take all the weapons, which disqualified him completely, as it violates our autonomy. It’s clear to us that this is a totally political issue and we have to be prepared to carry out our work, professionally, as you have seen us do it.”
在交接儀式上，市長對到場的記者們說：“今天我們向本市的警察發放彈弓。州長決定解除警局的所有武裝，這說明他是個完全不合格的州長，因為這侵犯了我們的自治權。對我們來說這完全是一個政治問題，我們必須準備好開展我們的本職工作，正如你們所看到的。”
Photos of the Alvarado police officers wearing their unusual sidearms and videos of Mayor Ruiz Rosas handing them out went viral on Mexican social media, and prompted a response from the Verracruz government. In an official statement, governor Ángel Yunes Linares warned policemen in Alvarado that they cannot continue doing their job unarmed and that continuing to do so would be against the law, and they could be subject to prosecution.
阿爾瓦拉多市警察佩戴不尋常的武器裝備的照片和魯伊斯•羅薩斯向他們發放彈弓的視頻在墨西哥社交媒體上傳瘋了，促使韋拉克魯斯州政府做出反應。在一份官方聲明中，州長利納雷斯警告阿爾瓦拉多市的警察說，沒有武器就不能繼續執行公務，如果繼續執行公務將是違法的，並會被起訴。
But don’t slingshots count as weapons in the right hands? Plus, this wouldn’t be the first time Mexican police would have to fight crime with slingshots. In 2007, over 60 slingshots were issued to officers in the violent border city of Tijuana, after their firearms had been confiscated by army soldiers, on allegations of collusion with drug traffickers.
不過，彈弓到了行家手裡也能算作武器，不是嗎？況且，這也不是墨西哥警察第一次被迫用彈弓打擊犯罪。2007年，在暴力犯罪猖獗的邊境城市提華納，因當地警員被指控和毒販勾結，被軍隊沒收了武器，當地政府就向警員發放了60多個彈弓。
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