A grenade exploded outside of the offices of the newspaper El Norte in the city of Monterrey, in northern Mexico, reported the news agency Notimex on Tuesday, July 10. The newspaper belongs to the Grupo Reforma company, whose headquarters are located in Mexico City.
A surveillance video caught the image of a person throwing an explosive object at the La Silla office parking lot, where the newspaper El Norte is edited, according to the news agency DPA.
This is the fifth explosive attack against Mexican news media outlets in 2012.
El Norte also reported similar attacks in the past two years. On March 31, 2011, the building was attacked with a grenade and a similar attack happened on Jan. 10 in the same year. On Sept. 20, 2010, the newspaper suffered its first attack after an explosive object was thrown near the building. In all the cases, the attacks left only material damages and no one was injured.
In 2008, Alejandro Junco de la Vega, president of Grupo Reforma, left his home in Monterrey due to increasing drug trafficking related threats and moved with his family to Austin, Texas, reported the Associated Press.
Mexico is the most-dangerous country in the American continent for practicing journalism. See this map about attacks against the Mexican press, made by the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas.
Note from the editor: This story was originally published by the Knight Center’s blog Journalism in the Americas, the predecessor of LatAm Journalism Review.
