Serbian police officers of the Special Anti-Terrorist Unit pose for a picture in their base outside Belgrade October 8, 2014. When the killing of an unarmed black teenager by a white policeman in Ferguson, Missouri, in August sparked sometimes violent protests, the response of police in camouflage gear and armoured vehicles wielding stun grenades and assault rifles seemed more like a combat operation than a public order measure. Some U.S. police departments have recently acquired U.S. military-surplus hardware from wars abroad, but there are many law enforcers around the world whose rules of engagement also allow the use of lethal force with relatively few restrictions. But for every regulation that gives police wide scope to use firearms, there is another code that sharply limits their use. In Serbia, police may use measures ranging from batons to special vehicles, water cannon and tear gas on groups of people who have gathered illegally and are behaving in a way that is violent or could cause violence, but they may use firearms only when life is endangered. (Photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters)

Children eat watermelons to meet the “beginning of autumn” at a kindergarten in Handan, China on August 7, 2015. Chinese tradition to eat watermelons or peaches before that day symbolises “biting away summer”. The solar term ‘beginning of autumn’ falls on 8 August this year. (Photo by Xinhua/REX Shutterstock)

Rick Sorenson, owner of the Rio Ramaza Marina, wades in the Sacramento River after securing an old paddlewheel boat on his property as the river makes its way up the levee on Garden Highway in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, January 9, 2017. (Photo by Hector Amezcua/The Sacramento Bee via AP Photo)

An Orthodox child is given an icy dip in a lake in celebration of Epiphan, near the village of Vorontsovka, some 20 km from the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, 19 January 2019. People believe that bathing in blessed waters during the holiday of Epiphany strengthens their spirit and body. (Photo by Igor Kovalenko/EPA/EFE)

People protest at the Boston Free Speech Rally in Boston, USA on August 19. 2017. With the Boston Free Speech rally was closed to the media (despite the Boston Common being a public space), a lot of the media’s coverage centred on the tensions within the larger counter-protest. (Photo by Stephanie Keith/Reuters)

Belarus' Aryna Sabalenka poses with the 2023 Australian Open winner's trophy in Royal Botanic Garden in Melbourne on January 29, 2023, following her victory over Kazakhstan's Elena Rybakina in the women's singles final of the tennis tournament. (Photo by Carl Recine/Reuters)

Tomoka Miyazaki of Japan hits a return against Lin Hsiang-Ti of Taiwan in their women's singles quarter-final match during the Hong Kong Open badminton tournament in Hong Kong on September 12, 2025. (Photo by Peter Parks/AFP Photo)

The legs of camel and sheep for the “Living Nativity” scene, and Rockettes, of the “Radio City Christmas Special”, are juxtaposed as they pose for photos outside New York's Radio City Music Hall, Tuesday, October 28, 2014. The show is scheduled to open Friday, November 7, 2014 and continue through Wednesday, December 31, 2014. The “Living Nativity” has been part of the Christmas Spectacular since its inception in 1933. (Photo by Richard Drew/AP Photo)