◎俞智敏

The Dutch prime minister denounced as "irresponsible" a claim by a retired U.S. general that gay Dutch soldiers were partly to blame for allowing Europe’s worst massacre since World War II.

一名美軍退休將領聲稱，荷蘭同志士兵是導致歐洲發生二戰以來最慘重大屠殺案部份原因的說法，遭荷蘭總理譴責為「不負責任」。

Dutch officials were outraged by retired Gen. John Sheehan’s recent remarks at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Sheehan claimed that Dutch military leaders had called the presence of gay soldiers in the army "part of the problem" that allowed Serb forces to overrun the Srebrenica enclave in Bosnia in July 1995 and kill some 8,000 Muslim men.

荷蘭官員對於退休將領席恩最近在美國參院軍事委員會聽證會上的說法感到憤怒。席恩聲稱，荷軍領袖曾表示軍中有同志士兵存在，正是讓塞爾維亞部隊於1995年7月攻佔波士尼亞的斯雷布雷尼察飛地，並殺害了8000名穆斯林男子的「部份問題所在」。

Dutch troops were serving in the undermanned U.N. peacekeeping force in Srebrenica when they were overrun by heavily armed Serb forces, who went on to turn the surrounding countryside into killing fields littered with mass graves.

荷軍部隊當時在人手短缺的聯合國斯雷布雷尼察維和部隊中值勤，卻被塞裔重裝部隊所擊敗，塞裔部隊隨即把鄰近鄉村變成了殺戮戰場，當地遍布亂葬崗。

Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende called Sheehan’s comments irresponsible and said that "these remarks should never have been made." "Toward Dutch troops-homosexual or heterosexual-it is way off the mark to talk like that about people and the work they do under very difficult circumstances," he said.

荷蘭總理巴克南德稱席恩的說法不負責任，並表示「這種言論根本不該出現。」「對荷蘭部隊，不分同性戀者或異性戀者，對處於非常艱困狀況的人及其工作提出這種論調，實在是太過離譜。」

Sheehan, a former NATO commander who retired from the military 1997, was speaking in opposition to a proposal to allow gays to serve openly in the U.S. military.

曾任北約指揮官的席恩已於1997年退休，他發表上述言論是為了反對一項建議准許同志公開在美軍部隊中服役的提案。

新聞辭典

be to blame：片語，指導致某事發生的原因，如The hot weather is partly to blame for the water shortage.（炎熱的天氣是導致缺水的原因之一。）

overrun：動詞，指（侵略軍等）橫行於某地、肆虐、擊敗，如The position of the forward infantry was overrun by large numbers of enemy troops at dawn.（先頭步兵隊的陣地在清晨被大批敵軍所攻佔。）

be off the mark：片語，指不正確，如They said the course would be easy but that turned out to be way off the mark.（他們說這堂課很輕鬆，結果根本不是那麼回事。）