The Guatemalan press reported 33 assaults during 2011, an election year, up from 19 incidents in 2010, according to a report published on Thursday, March, 15, by the Journalist Observatory of the Cerigua Agency.
An article published Wednesday, March 14, in the digital newspaper El Faro of El Salvador has stirred up a firestorm of controversy and threats against the newspaper and its reporters, prompting journalists and free press organizations around the world to express concern and show solidarity with their Central American colleagues.
On Thursday, March, 15, a live interview conducted by Globovisión was violently interrupted by members of the community council of Isla de la Culebra, in the state of Carabobo, according to the National Union of Journalists of Caracas.
On Thursday, March, 15, a Venezuelan journalist was publicly threatened with kidnapping while broadcasting live for a TV and radio station in Anzoátegui, reported the news site Noticiasdeaquí.net.
On Sunday, March 11, the group La Piedrita (Little Stone) held a protest at the entrance of television station Globovisión, requesting the Venezuelan government investigate the death of two group members killed in an armed confrontation that occurred in a Caracas neighborhood on Saturday, reported the newspaper El Universo.
Colombian journalist and political leader Argemiro Cárdenas Agudelo was shot to death on Thursday, March 15, reported the Foundation for Press Freedom (FLIP in Spanish).
The deputy director of a local newspaper in Mexico said that he was detained for an hour in the mayor's office, where he was forced to reveal his source for a news story, reported the Center for Journalism and Public Ethics (CEPET in Spanish).
A Honduran Catholic Church official accused of assaulting a journalist will be tried by the supreme court, the highest court of justice, due to his church status, reported the organization C-Libre.
A magazine in the border city of Tijuana, Mexico, said that its journalists received death threats in the comment section of it's website, reported the Center of Journalism and Public Ethics (CEPET).
In the early morning of Tuesday, March 6, a communications tower of a community radio station was destroyed in Santo Antônio do Leverger, roughly 20 miles from Cuiabá, capital of the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso. The journalist in charge of the radio station, Júlio Pedroso, said he suspected that the vandalism was tied to political reasons, reported the news site Gazeta Digital.
The radio host of the program "Semicolon," Adolfo Superlano, requested protection from the prosecutor's office as the journalist said he felt threatened and feared being physically abused by officials of the state of Barinas, in southwest Venezuela, reported the network International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) on Friday, March 9.
The organization Reporters without Borders expressed concern that charges were dropped against the suspects in the killing of a journalist, cameraman Normando García, who was killed in the Dominican Republic on Aug. 7, 2008, reported the organization.