Journalist Moreira Neto reports in his blog that Councilman Zé Gomes allegedly attacked him after a June 3 council meeting in the northern city of Paço do Lumiar, Maranhão.
Coinciding with a call by international organizations for increased freedom of expression on the Internet, a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) report urges governments to support internet use as a human right, GigaOm reports.
Journalist Mario Esteban López managed to escape with his life after the matches were too wet for his kidnappers to light the more than two gallons of gasoline they poured on him, EFE reports.
Zezé Perrella, the president of the Brazilian soccer team Cruzeiro and former federal and state deputy for Minas Gerais, has vowed retaliation against a journalist, Amália Gurgel, of the newspaper Hoje em Dia, after a May 29 story that revealed Perrella had not declared all his possessions or property, according to the blog Chico Maia.
Youths from the slum German Complex in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro paid tribute to assassinated journalist Tim Lopes on Thursday, June 2, nine years after the reporter was killed in that same region, according to G1.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) released its annual Impunity Index, which ranks three Latin American countries among those where killers of journalist regularly escape justice, The Associated Press reports.
A bill that would criminalize leaking or publishing information on confidential criminal investigations and trials passed committee in Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies May 31, O Globo reports.
The Mexican police found the body of journalist Noel López Olguín in a clandestine grave in Chinameca, Veracruz, The Associated Press and Milenio report. The journalist disappeared March 8, presumably kidnapped by drug traffickers.
Representatives from the United Nations, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Organization of American States, and the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights signed the "Joint Declaration on Freedom of Expression and the Internet", a document that urges governments not to limit freedom of expression online, reported EFE.
Reporters Pablo Hernández and Ismael Villagómez of the Mexican newspaper Norte were arrested by city police while covering a police raid on pirated merchandise, according to Norte Digital. The police attacked the journalists, calling them "nosy," reported El Mexicano. Agents also arrested Univisión reporter Luis Escalera, added Tiempo.
Paraguayan journalist and radio announcer in Ciudad del Este, Carlos Bottino, has filed suit against the governor of Alto Paraná, Nelson Aguinagalde, accusing him of threatening the journalist with death, reported Última Hora.
In response to government attempts to approve laws regulating the press, the Brazilian National Association of Newspapers (ANJ in Portuguese) launched on May 26 a self-regulation program, reported Folha de S. Paulo.