In the Mexican state of Veracruz, one of the 10 most-dangerous places in the world to practice journalism, fear is surging that more journalists are going to be killed. According to the digital newspaper El Arsenal, a new list is circulating with the names of journalists slated to be killed in coming days, and the warning comes from an official in the state prosecutor's office.
In May, three photographers were tortured and killed and at the end of April, Proceso magazine journalist Regina Martínez was strangled to death in Xalapa, the state capital. A total of eight journalists have been killed in the state of Veracruz since June 2011, and not a single one of the crimes has been resolved.
Currently, a photojournalist whose family was killed in Veracruz is seeking political asylum in the United States. During the 10th Austin Forum on Journalism in the Americas, the photojournalist, Miguel Ángel López Solana, told of the threats against him and spoke of the difficult working conditions and risks that journalists in Veracruz suffer. The newspaper Notiver, where five journalists have been killed, denied that López Solana was an employee and denied that it had failed to fulfill its financial obligations to the family of columnist Miguel Ángel López Velasco -- López Solana's father -- who was killed along with his wife and a son.
Although authorities blame organized crime for the killings of journalists, some of the journalists themselves had said before they were killed that they had been threatened by state officials, according to the freedom of expression organization Article 19.
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.
