Seven years after adding the word police in different languages to the back of their cruisers, London police have spent days defending themselves against haters.

Officers at police headquarters and the force’s spokesperson have been fielding calls, emails and messages on Facebook and Twitter from people across Canada since Monday, when a Facebook user posted a photo of a London patrol car with the Arabic word for police on the back.

That photo, which police believe came from a Facebook user in Quebec, has since been shared thousands of times and caught the attention of social media users across Canada and the United States.

Most were angry about the use Arabic and didn’t seem to know much, if anything, about why the police force incorporates foreign languages into its fleet.

“It’s something that’s been around since 2009. We’ve put those languages on our cruisers as a way to be more inclusive of the members of the city of London,” Const. Sandasha Bough said Thursday.

“We have been explaining we have five different languages on our cruisers besides French and English,” she said.

Besides Arabic, police chose Chinese, Vietnamese, Persian and Polish, she said.

The service is also looking at adding other languages to the cruisers, such as Spanish.

The word police — which works in both English and French, the country’s two official languages — is now displayed on the sides of all police cruisers and more prominently than the small decal bearing the additional translated version in one of the other languages.

“It was the Arabic language they were criticizing,” said Bough, who shared some of the backlash emails she’s received over the past two days:

— “Why is there Arabic on cruisers? Why are there not other languages?”

— “I recently reviewed an email that had pictures of London cruisers that had Arabic writing. Is this true or is it a joke?”

— “I would like an explanation.”

— “You have no right, London Police. We have two official languages . . .”

The flap over the lingo on the cruisers even made its way south of the border, where a U.S. blogger wrote the cruisers were serving the “Arabic speaking population,” and that “Canadians see this as an example of favoritism and inconsistent with French Canadian values.”

Offsetting that, was a bit of balance, including from a woman who thanked police for using Polish — London is home to a large Polish community — on a cruiser.

The multi-language cruisers are one of several steps London police have taken to form relationships with diverse communities.

“We are trying to become more diverse and more inclusive,” said Bough, noting the police service’s just-revised website, londonpolice.ca, can be accessed in dozens of languages as well.

“We are open to putting more languages on our cruisers,” she said.

jlobrien@postmedia.com