Amid growing conflicts with the media, President Fernando Lugo said he is arranging for the UN's special rapporteur and a delegation from the Inter American Press Association to evaluate in an "impartial and disinterested manner" the country's state of press freedom, La Nación reports.
Jorge Orellana, known as Georgino, died Tuesday night, April 21, after being shot by a gunman seconds after he walked outside the offices of Canal de Televisión Honduras, where he produced the TV program "En Vivo con Georgino" (Live with Georgino) in San Pedro Sul, El Tiempo reports.
The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, an association of women whose children disappeared during the dictatorship (1976-1983), have organized a demonstration April 29 to give an "ethical and political judgement of those journalists complicit" with the military regime.
Arsenio Zambrano Ocampo, a well-known independent photographer, died last week after he was stabbed in his home in Ibagué, in Tolima department, the Colombian Federation of Journalists (Fecolper) reports. Citizens and colleagues were shocked by the news, El Tiempo says.
Spanish journalist Judith Torrea has spent 12 years working as an independent journalist. Last year she created the blog “Ciudad Juárez, en la sombra del narcotráfico” (Ciudad Juárez, in the shadow of narcotrafficking), where she reports on the crimes of drug mafias, stories that traditional media aren't always able to report. For this work, she has won the Ortega y Gasset Prize for Digital Journalism, El País reports. See this recent interview with Torrea in English by Salon.com.
While Chile's president is pressured to sell his stake in a TV channel, Ecuador's Rafael Correa administration ordered the sale of parcels of shares in two TV stations that were seized by the state almost two years ago, El Universo reports.
María Isabella Cordero, former anchor of the morning news on Televisa, was shot to death Friday night in the city of Chihuahua, while leaving a restaurant parking lot, La Jornada and El Diario report. A friend who was in the car with her was also killed. See EFE's report in English.
Oscar Sánchez Madan was released from prison this week after serving a three-year term for “social dangerousness,” a vague charge he received after covering a local corruption scandal. He tells Radio Martí that he wants to keep writing about current affairs on the island, including Havana’s human rights violations, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reports.
Representatives of social movements and political and human rights organizations protested in Buenos Aires this week in defense of the broadcast reform law that was passed last October but suspended due to a court ruling in March, La Nación and EFE reported.
TV host and radio broadcaster Handson Laércio was shot Wednesday, April 14, while leaving his home in Bacabal, Maranhão, to host his program on TV Mearim, the news portal Imirante reports. On entering his car, Laércio was confronted by his attacker and was shot in the hand.