The Honduran press has been victim to several recent attacks. Two journalists survived armed attacks and another received death threats, said the organization C-Libre.
On Saturday, April 28, Elder Joel Aguilar, correspondent for Channel 6, survived an armed attack while driving through the department of Copán, on border the with Guatemala, bound for the city of San Pedro Sula, said the newspaper Proceso.
The attack could be traced back to a story he did on the theft of trucks carrying coffee -- a story which prompted him to request police protection.
One of his colleagues, journalist Santiago Cerna, news director and host of two news broadcasts on the Caribbean Communications Network Television 6, said that he has received death threats via phone calls and text messages, said C-libre. The reporter filed a complaint with the National Commissioner for Human Rights in the city of San Pedro Sula.
Also, on Thursday, April 26, strangers shot at the home of a TV reporter in the Caribbean town of Omoa. Police did not respond to a call for help. Selvin Martinez, of the JBN TV station, said he suspects that the attack was related to a citizen complaint against the mayor who denied financial aid to a woman.
Honduras, where a murder is committed every 74 minutes, is the country with the highest homicide rate in the world according to the United Nations, and it is the second-most dangerous country for journalists in the Americas. For more information, see this Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas map on attacks on the press in Central America.
