Mexican journalist Marco Lara Klahr released the book "No More 'Payers': a Guide to Journalism on the Presumption of Innocence and Criminal Justice Reform" to encourage Mexican journalists to respect the presumption of innocence when writing about suspects of violent crimes.
The Venezuelan National Telecommunications Commission (CONATEL) seized equipment from four radio stations in the northeastern state of Mongas for allegedly not having the appropriate license, reported the Press and Society Institute (IPYS in Spanish) on Dec. 1.
Award-winning Colombian journalist Hollman Morris called on Congress to listen to the victims of wiretaps as testimony in the trial and investigation of former president Álvaro Uribe for illegal wiretapping and spying on journalists.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF in French) criticized Guatemala's General Telecommunications Law, which allows for the nearly automatic renewal of radio and television frequencies for 25 years to those who already leased them.
After arguments from the National Federation of Journalists (Fenaj in Portuguese) and similar journalist groups, senators approved a bill to amend the Constitution that requires practicing journalists to have an advanced degree on Nov. 30.
Freedom of expression organizations in Nicaragua protested the rumored sale of television station Canal 2 to the Mexican businessman Ángel González, who is also the owner of Canal 10--the most watched station in the Central American country--as well as channels 4, 9, and 11.
The Mexican Senate approved the decriminalization of slander and libel, reported the newspaper El Universal on Nov. 29.
On Wednesday, Nov. 23, the Mexican Supreme Court denied the appeal of the newspaper La Jornada that had sued the weekly magazine Letras Libres for defamation, according to El Economista.
Journalist and mayor of the city of Londrina in the Brazilian state of Paraná, Homero Barbosa Neto, has demanded the removal of a political cartoon published on a blog criticizing the city government, reported Blog do Esmael.
"I haven't left work early since Mouriño's plane fell. Be careful fellow flyers," posted a Twitter user in Mexico just days before the helicopter carrying the Mexican interior minister and seven others crashed on Nov. 11 outside Mexico City. "Tomorrow on 11/11 a secretary will fall from the sky," tweeted another user with the handle Morf0.
Leocenis García, editor of the Venezuelan newspaper 6to Poder, announced on Nov. 9 that he would go on a hunger strike for an "undetermined time" to reinvigorate the appeal against his detention, reported El Universal. García was arrested Aug. 30 after publishing a cover satirizing several female members of President Hugo Chávez's administration.
After publishing a series of reports on government salaries in all three branches that exceed constitutional limits, the news site "Congresso em Foco" (Congress in Focus) became the target of a flood of legal charges from the public servants in the Brazilian Senate, reported the website on Oct. 31.