Only hours after a TV host was killed in northern Mexico, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reported the disappearance of another journalist in Mexico, where in the last four years violence linked to drug trafficking has exploded.
President Evo Morales, who has a tense relationship with the press, lashed out again against some opposition media, accusing them of trying to weaken his administration, IFEX reports.
In an unprecedented decision favoring transparency about the impact of drug trafficking, Mexico’s Federal Institute for Access to Information (IFAI) ordered the national intelligence service to furnish precise data on the number of people killed in clashes between authorities and organized crime groups, El Universal reports.
TV host José Luis Cerda of the Televisa network was found assassinated in the northern city of Monterrey—which in recent months has become the site of several attacks on media and aggression on the press by organized crime. He was kidnapped the day before by a group of armed men, Terra reports.
Nearly 50 Mexican media organizations signed an agreement Thursday about coverage of drug trafficking. The pact seeks to prevent excessive publication of violent images and stories and to guarantee the safety of journalists who expose themselves daily to the growing violence of organized crime, which has left more than 34,000 deaths in four years. See stories in English by the Associated Press and Reuters.
Monday, primetime in Cuba. While state television broadcast a new episode of a series of allegations against the opposition, "The Reasons of Cuba,” this time about independent bloggers, the movement's leader, Yoani Sánchez, broadcast her own talk program with dissident journalists, in which she defended the right to access and use Internet on the island, Radio Martí reports.
While President Rafael Correa’s March 18 announcement that he was suing a pair of journalists is still the talk of the town, the leader announced another lawsuit – this time against an editorial writer and the directors of El Universo newspaper, Vistazo.com reports.
Riot police threw a teargas canister at journalist Lidieth Díaz and cameraman Adolfo Sierra for TV Cholusat Sur, attempting to stop the pair from filming a teacher protest in the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa, Revistazo.com reports.
Reporters without Borders (RSF) reports that it has received a copy of a new set of threats against journalists and human rights activists in Colombia from the Black Eagles paramilitary group, which for the last five years has engaged in acts of violence and intimidation against the press.
A journalist and a cameraman for the news show CM& on Colombia’s TV Canal 1 were attacked with rocks and sticks by people living in a mining zone in northeastern Colombia, while seeking interviews with locals about a Canadian mining company's decision to postpone a project, El Tiempo reports.