Security Minister Óscar Álvarez offered $5,200 for information that helps to capture the killers of five journalists and other crimes against prosecutors, judges, and attorneys, La Tribuna reports.
Evaristo Pacheco Solís, a reporter for the weekly “Visión Informativa” (Informative Vision), was found shot to death Friday near the state capital, Chilpancingo, Guerrero, in southern Mexico, the Committee to Protect Journalists reports.
The killings of three Mexican journalists in January alone, and the news that 15 people, mostly teenagers, were killed at a birthday party in Ciudad Juárez have called new international attention to Mexico’s drug-related violence, which is reported to have killed more than 1,000 people in the first 34 days of this year. Meanwhile, Mexican media workers brace for more attacks.
Jorge Ochoa Martinez, editor in chief of El Sol de La Costa newspaper, was assassinated with a gunshot to the face, becoming the third journalist killed in Mexico this year. His body was found in a car parked close to City Hall in Ayutla de los Libres, Guerrero, the Latin American Herald Tribune reports. Read this report by the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Jose Luis Romero, a reporter for the Línea Directa radio station who was known for his broadcasts on drug trafficking, was found shot to death Saturday on a highway a few miles from Los Mochis, Sinaloa, where he was kidnapped two weeks ago. The Committee to Protect Journalists, Reuters and the Associated Press have stories in English, and many sources have stories in Spanish.
The rash of attacks on Mexican journalists has resulted in the first assassination this year. Two reporters from the newspaper Zócalo Saltillo were kidnapped Thursday night, and one of them, Valentín Valdés Espinosa, was found dead outside a motel this morning (Jan. 8) with a warning note on his chest, the newspaper reports. The message's contents were not revealed.
To investigate the unpunished assassination of Guillermo Cano, who was shot by hitmen 23 years ago in Bogotá outside the offices of his family's newspaper, El Espectador, a team of Colombian journalists have produced this excellent multimedia report: 23 Years of Impunity and Silence.