A Brazilian court has prohibited Diario de Pernambuco and Jornal do Commercio, two of the largest newspapers in the state of Pernambuco, from mentioning the name or show pictures of the president of the state’s Legislative Assembly, Guilherme Uchoa, news portal Terra reported. The decision also applies to Brazilian station TV Clube.
A court in Paraná state, located in the south of Brazil, prohibited the newspaper Gazeta do Povo from publishing information about the ongoing investigations against the head judge of the State Supreme Court, appellate judge Clayton Camargo, in yet another case of judicial censorship in Brazil, reported the newspaper Zero Hora.
The recent surge of legal actions against private media outlets in Venezuela has caught the attention of several journalism organizations, who have described them as attacks on freedom of expression.
A media phenomenon has emerged in Brazil in the wake of the massive protests that are spreading throughout the country since June. The news collective Mídia NINJA, broadcasting live from the streets with its "no cuts, no censorship" model, has attracted the attention and admiration of thousands of people in the last few weeks.
José Cristian Góes, a reporter from the Brazilian state of Sergipe, was sentenced on July 4 to seven months and a week in jail for writing and posting a fictional short story on local political cronyism in May 2012 for his blog Infonet, reported the daily Conjur.
Amid the massive protests spreading throughout Brazil -- sparked by an increase in bus fares -- the mass media coverage also has become a target of criticism.
Thousands of Venezuelans that used to support Globovisión, a television channel that before being sold a few weeks ago was known for its opposition to the Chavista government, expressed their resentment on Twitter and unfollowed the channel after journalist Francisco 'Kiko' Bautista was fired, reported newspaper El Universal.
Judges from the Brazilian capital decided on Wednesday, May 22, to uphold an order to censor newspaper Estado de S. Paulo, which continues to be unable to publish news stories about a police operation that involved relatives of prominent politician José Sarney, reported the newspaper.
The president of Honduras, Porfirio Lobo, has presented the Congress with a proposal that toughens content regulations on the media, including regulation on schedules and punishments for broadcasting violent or obscene content, content that celebrates or defends crime, or content that goes against morals and good behavior, said La Prensa. Lobo’s proposed telecom law is popularly known as the “ley mordaza” – the gag law – due to its restrictions on press freedom.
Brazil has a big lead as the country with the most government requests to remove online content by judicial order in the latest Google Transparency Report, released on Thursday, April 25. In the period between July and December 2012, the search giant received 1,461 court-ordered requests from governments around the world to remove content, including YouTube videos and search results, with nearly 43 percent of them coming from Brazilian authorities.