The body of Honduran cameraman Manuel de Jesús Varela Murillo, 32, was found with three bullet wounds in the face on Oct. 23 near a popular neighborhood in Tegucigalpa, C-Libre reported. It appeared Varela Murillo had been killed a week before being found.
The International Press Institute has urged the Caribbean countries of Aruba, Curaçao and Saint Martin to examine and change their criminal defamation laws.
Bolivian journalist Raúl Peñaranda had to quit his newspaper to save it.
The last six months represented the worst semester for journalists in the Americas in the last five years, according to the Inter American Press Association, news agency EFE reported. The killing of journalists and the various government measures that restrict access to information were some of the reasons that IAPA cited during its General Assembly, which took place in Denver last weekend.
The concentration of the media by “autocratic” governments is one of the “the greatest obstacles for the freedom of the press in the western hemisphere during the last six months of the year” and the killing of 14 journalists represents one of the highest numbers in the last 20 years, the Inter American Press Association noted during the conclusion of its 69th General Assembly in Denver last weekend.
Carlos Martínez is a reporter with Salvadoran news site El Faro who specializes in covering violence in Central America. He's part of the publication's Sala Negra team, which was created in 2011 with the goal of creating a model for permanent coverage of prisons, gangs, organized crime and violence in the region.
Viltor García, a bodyguard for cable channel director Karen Rottman, had just finished his shift on Oct. 19 when he was shot and killed by attackers in a vehicle with tinted glass windows in Guatemala City, informed Reporters without Borders (RSF). Rottman is the director of Vea Canal, an independent cable channel critical of the nation's administration.
The Cuban government appointed new editors for its two main newspapers, Granma and Juventud Rebelde, describing the move as part of a “renewal” process to improve the country’s official press, BBC News reported.
There have been 150 preliminary investigations into attacks against journalists in the first nine months of this year initiated by the Special Prosecutor on Attention to Crimes Committed Against Freedom of Expression (FEADLE) of the Attorney General's Office (PGR) in Mexico, informed deputy director Alberto Peralta Flores, according to the website of the Mexican magazine Proceso.
By Alsha Khan In the last twelve months in Venezuela, there has been a decline of Internet freedom, showing a substantial increase in the censorship of opinions about political events, like the death of Hugo Chávez and the presidential elections in April, according to the report Freedom on the Net published by Freedom House in […]