The Venezuelan Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MTC in Spanish) told the newspaper TalCual that it would not longer have access to MTC representatives after publishing a report detailing problems with the metro system in the capital, Caracas.
The Press and Society Institute criticized the Ministry's decision, "MTC's posture toward TalCual is against the Venezuelan Constitution, which guarantees the right to access of public information in Article 28."
The reporter Daniel Palacios Ybarra, author of TalCual's report, commented on the Ministry's media blackout on hisTwitter account.
In 2010, TalCual had another run-in with the Venezuelan government after publishing a satirical editorial describing an imaginary Venezuela without President Hugo Chávez. Again in 2010, the newspaper was among those cited by a Venezuelan court after it prohibited the press from publishing images of violence in the Andean country.
