A Chilean journalist was arrested when trying to cover a fire at a plastic factory in the Huechuraba community, north of Santiago, Chile, reported the newspaper La Nación.
Journalist Andrés Jara, from the Cooperative Radio, was trying to reach the fire when a police officer stopped him and arrested him in a "very violent way," even after Jara identified himself as a journalist, according to Cooperative Radio.
At the police station, Jara was accused of "abuse against police work," and was let free later that night, according to the news site Emol.
“In the last year about 20 to 25 colleagues have been beaten and arrested while performing their journalistic work, and I think this is an extreme situation that forces us to be much more drastic in our actions," said the president of the Journalists Union of Chile, Marcelo Castillo, reported La Nación. Castillo also noted that the police violence against journalists in Chile had been documented by Reporters Without Borders.
Despite complaints, the police department still did not provide an official explanation for the incidents, reported the newspaper El Mostrador.
