Alberto Maquieira, the president of newsprint manufacturer Papel Prensa, has received several threatening letters that say things like “Maquieira, we are watching you,” La Nación reports.
The dissident journalist Guillermo Fariñas, who spent four months on hunger strike to demand the release of political prisoners, was released from the hospital and said he wants to continue writing articles, BBC reports.
The prosecutor’s office has charged Perla Jaimes, the lawyer who both represents Globovisión owner Guillermo Zuloaga and the opposition station itself, with allegedly obstructing a court order during the raid of the businessman’s house last May, El Carabobeño reports.
Prosecutors have asked journalist José Pomacusi, the director of the magazine Poder y Placer (Power and Pleasure) and the TV show No Mentiras (No Lies) to explain his alleged connections to a terrorist organization in the eastern city of Santa Cruz, EFE reports. He has asked the prosecution to "clear his name" and "respect free expression," Los Tiempos adds.
An internal government document classifies journalists as “acceptable” or not depending on their ideology and recommends ways of punishing “unacceptable” journalists, for example, by delaying press releases, the Associated Press reports. The Uruguayan Press Association said the two-year old document, which was publicized last week, is reminiscent of tactics used during the country’s military dictatorship.
Four journalism organizations are oppenly opposing a new electoral law, enacted three weeks ago, which they say violates free expression. (Read the full text PDF of the law in Spanish here.)
Renowned journalist Hollman Morris can now travel to the United States and attend Harvard University as a Nieman Fellow, after the Department of State decided to grant Morris the student visa that it had originally denied him, the Nieman Foundation reports.
President Hugo Chavez announced that his government effectively owns more than a 45 percent stake in Globovisión, a station highly critical of his administration, and that in the next several days he would appoint a member to the channel’s board, Reuters and El Universal report.
Cuban authorities have blocked Yoani Sanchez, author of Generation Y, from traveling to Brazil to see a documentary on censorship in Cuba and Honduras, EFE reports.
The newspaper La Nación and the oil company YPF are engaged in a public fight over the company's advertising policy and the newspaper's editorial agenda, according to the newspaper Los Andes.
Alejandro Aguirre, president of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) said that in Latin America, democratically elected governments are falling to authoritarianism and increasingly restricting press freedom, reported Voice of America.
After two days in jail in Venezuela, two Colombian journalists from the television station RCN and two more from a regional station were deported, accused of illegally entering Venezuela, reported the Latin American Herald Tribune and El Tiempo.