A judge absolved Colombian journalist Claudia López of libel, after accusations leveled against her by ex-President Ernesto Samper (1994-98) prompted by a column in which she suggested Samper was involved in a pair of homicides, reported RCN Radio.
2010 was a year plagued by setbacks for press freedom and threats to journalists worldwide, according to Reporters without Borders’ (RSF) Spanish-language report titled “Freedom of the Press Report Worldwide in 2010.”
Cuban dissident journalist Iván Hernández was freed from prison Saturday, Feb. 18, after spending eight years in jail. His release comes in the latest round of political prisoners being freed, which started earlier this month.
Responding to public outcry, the government of Mato Grosso do Sul state in Brazil plans to remove access restrictions to the site of the online newspaper Midiamax, which was blocked on public computers connected to the system of the Superintendency of Information Management, Midiamax reports.
Antônio Carlos Almeida Campelo, a judge in Brazil’s 4th Federal Civil Court in the northern state of Pará, issued an injunction blocking journalist Lúcio Flávio Pinto from publishing any information about a case against several business people in the state, Diário Online reports.
Organized crime, whether drug cartels, mafias or paramilitary forces, poses the greatest threat to journalists today, according to a new report released Thursday, Feb. 24, from Reporters Without Borders. In the last 10 years, 141 journalists have been killed for reporting on organized crime, the report said.
Freelance journalist and former Associated Press correspondent John Enders says that members of Venezuela's intelligence agency were harassing and attempting to intimidate him, the Press and Society Institute (IPYS) reports via IFEX.
In the midst of a wave of violence against the media following the 2009 Honduran coup, which includes the death of 10 journalists, the government said it will create a special unit to investigate crimes against journalists, La Tribuna reports.
Mexican journalist Carlos Loret de Mola, the anchor of a news show on Televisa, was held for eight hours upon his arrival to Cairo, first by a group of civilian “vigilantes” and later by the army, which confiscated his cell phone, El Universal reports.
El Nuevo Diario newspaper journalist Luis Galeano told the police and several human rights groups that he received a phone call and a letter warning him that he would be killed, Notimex reports.
Carlos Santos, a journalist in Mossoró in the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte, was convicted to four months in prison for three blog posts that the city’s mayor found offensive, Mossoró Notícias reports. For each piece, he was sentenced to one month and ten days in prison and is required to donate approximately a total of $3,600 fines to charity.
Peruvian journalist Vicky Peláez, who was convicted of spying on the U.S. for Russian in June 2010, denied the charges and said she only pled guilty to win her freedom, Correo reports.