Posts Tagged ‘Colombia’
February 17th, 2011
On Wednesday 16 February, an unidentified group threw a
firebomb at journalist Rodolfo Zambrano’s home in Bolivar. He was unharmed as he was not there at the time. The attack caused damage to the exterior of his house, but firefighters were able to stop the flames from spreading inside. Journalists frequently face harassment in the South American country. Reporters without Borders has
placed Colombia in 145th place out of 178 countries for press freedom.
September 3rd, 2010
In Mexico’s northeastern state of Sinaloa, the Noreste newspaper issued a statement saying that its facilities were the target of an armed attack on 1 September 2010. The attack took place after a reporter received a threatening phone call from unidentified members of an organised gang. They fired bullets at the Noreste building and placed a banner with a message accusing the federal government of protecting two men who have been accused of being drug-traffickers.
In Colombia, on 30 August 2010, journalist Marco Tulio Valencia, the editor of the El Norte newspaper in Mariquita in southern Colombia, was the target of an assassination attempt when an unidentified individual fired shots at him. Valencia’s newspaper has reported on small-scale drug trafficking networks in Mariquita and that he believes the assassination attempt and threats could be linked to those reports.
July 13th, 2010
Hollman Morris, an internationally-renowned Colombian journalist,
has been barred from entering the United States to take up a fellowship at Harvard University. His visa application was denied after he was placed on a Patriot Act no-fly list. Morris has previously been publicly lauded by the State Department and
Human Rights Watch. His writing has been published around the world, and he has been received by the Pentagon, National Security Council, and the US ambassador in Bogota. The ban is thought to relate to Morris’ interviews with Colombia’s Farc guerillas, although critics have claimed that it stems from the Obama administration’s proximity to Colombia’s President Álvaro Uribe, whose government has long been criticised by Morris.
April 21st, 2010
On 16 April an independent photojournalist,
was killed at his home in
Ibagué. Arsenio Zambrano Ocampo, 62, was stabbed to death by two attackers, who were later arrested. One of the arrested was in possesion of Ocampo’s laptop. The photojournalist is the second media worker killed in Tolima within a week.
Mauricio Medina was murdered on 11 April.
April 14th, 2010
On 11 April, Mauricio Medina Moreno, director and founding member of the indigenous community radio CRIT 98.0 FM Estéreo,
was murdered in his home in the town of
Ortega. Medina, 50, died of multiple knife wounds. Although police described the murder as a ‘crime of passion’,
some organisations said that this label is often applied in order to avoid investigating links to a journalist’s work. (RSF)
April 13th, 2010
On 7 April, Edgar Astudillo Vásquez, radio producer of a news program on Radio Panzenú,
received a a pamphlet that said he would be killed before April 20 in any street in his home city of
Montería in the
Córdoba region. The death threats came the “Los Paisas paramilitary group. Since the murder of the radio journalist
Clodomiro Castilla, on 19 March, three journalists in Montería have been threatened.
July 22nd, 2009
The Constitutional Court of Columbia has declared several high level officials in contempt of court for not carrying out a court ruling issued 9 months ago ordering them to provide information and security to a journalist at risk. The court gave the President the Interior vice Minister and the National Police Director 48 hours to implement the measures. Read more
here
May 20th, 2009
Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa is an organisation that systematically monitors threats against the freedom of the press in Colombia, develops activities that contribute to the protection of journalists and promotes the fundamental right to information.
