Only a month after taking office, President Sebastián Piñera faces growing criticism by opponents and allies for not having transferred his ownership of the channel Chilevisión to a nonprofit organization as he promised during his campaign, La Nación and EFE report.
The Chamber of Deputies approved a bill this week that would make public information accessible to citizens. The text now passes to the Senate.
Mónica González Mujica, a veteran journalist whose investigative reporting repeatedly challenged the Pinochet regime, has won a UNESCO prize awarded to those who promote freedom of expression, particularly at the risk of their own lives.
Journalists from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico received the King of Spain International Journalism Prizes sponsored by EFE and Spain's international development agency. The winners, announced in January, received the prizes Tuesday from King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofía, in the Casa de América in Madrid.
Venezuela's new minister of communication and information, Tania Díaz, swore in the first 75 "communication guerrillas," members of school youth groups formed to “democratize” information and counterattack “the power of private media." See stories (in Spanish) by El Universal and El Nacional.
Mauricio Medina, founder of a community radio station for the Pijao indigenous people, was stabbed more than 20 times at his home Sunday in Ortega, Tolima (central Colombia), Reuters reports (Spanish). See a story in English by Colombia Reports.
Mexico's National Commission for Human Rights (CNDH) condemned the killing of newspaper columnist Enrique Villicaña Palomares and demanded investigation and punishment, La Jornada reports. Villicaña, a commentator for La Voz de Michoacán and former official in MIchoacán state, was found over the weekend in the western Mexican state, EFE and the Associated Press report.
The third team of the Investigative Reporting Unit of the Argentine Journalism Forum (FOPEA) published the multimedia report “The route of hake: from overfishing to a luxury good.” The package includes infographics, a fishing dictionary, and video interviews.
Luis Antonio Chévez, host of programming for young people on the W105 radio station, and his cousin were shot at dawn by unknown attackers in front of his house in San Pedro Sula, La Prensa reports.
Rains pounded Rio de Janeiro this week, killing hundreds of people–mostly in mudslides—and citizen reporters played a key role in conveying the magnitude of the disaster. In addition to blogs and Twitter, they channeled an enormous number of photos, texts, and videos through traditional news media, allowing for prompt and comprehensive coverage that never would have been possible if the reporters were working alone.