Brazil loves football – and it loves the game so much it’s hosting next year’s World Cup finals. But a huge number of fans from the state of Paraná are having a very hard time following their team this year because of media restrictions imposed by directors of the local club, Rafael Spuldar reports.
In Argentina, media organizations take sides: for or against the government. Graciela Mochkofsky tells the story behind the turf war between President Fernández de Kirchner and Grupo Clarín.
The Brazilian Congress is considering draft legislation to ease the publication of biographies without prior authorization from the subject, but the move is not without opposition, Rafael Spuldar reports.
Brazil’s position in free speech’s world charts has consistently worsened in recent years, Rafael Spulder writes from Sao Paolo.
Local broadcasters, the lifeblood of many Brazilian communities, face tough times. Rafael Spuldar reports
The Guatemalan daily El Periódico and Fundación MEPI have published an exposé of corruption in the current Guatemalan government. The story, with information and documents gathered during the first year in office of president Otto Perez Molina and vice president Roxana Baldetti, detailed a multi-million dollar web of corruption in a country where 50 per cent of the population lives on less than two dollars a day. After the story was published on 8 April, the newspaper was immediately the hit with a cyber attack, according to El Periodico’s publisher, José Rubén Zamora. The website went dead and nobody could read the story for a few days. Readers who did manage to access the website had their computers infected with a virus. […]
A photojournalist was gunned down on 14 April in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. Photographer Walgney Assis Carvalho was shot in the back during a day spent fishing in the town of Coronel Fabriciano. According to the police, Carvalho was accosted by a hooded man on a motorcycle who shot him several times before fleeing. The crime has been linked to the killing of a radio presenter last March. Police have not confirmed the cause of the crime. However, state deputy Durval Ângelo, who is president of the Human Rights Committee for Minas Gerais’s Legislative Assembly, posted on Twitter that the photographer had information about the shooting of radio presenter Rodrigo Neto, who was killed in the town of Ipatinga on 8 March. Although Neto’s […]
One month has passed since a radio presenter was gunned down in the Brazilian town of Ipatinga, in the state of Minas Gerais, with no results from the police investigation. Both his colleagues and authorities believe the crime was caused by sensitive information the journalist presented on this radio crime show. Rodrigo Neto was shot while leaving a restaurant on the evening of Friday 8 March. Two men on a motorcycle accosted him and opened fire. The presenter was hit on the head and on the chest. The gunmen escaped unidentified. The case is still being investigated by the police. State Deputy Durval Ângelo, who is president of the Human Rights Committee on Minas Gerais’s Legislative Assembly, claims the journalist had […]
A judge from the Brazilian State of Goiás has ruled that a football club director allegedly linked to the killing of a sports journalist must remain in prison while he awaits trial. Radio presenter Valério Luiz de Oliveira was gunned down at the front door of 820 AM radio station in the state capital Goiânia on 5 July 2012. Businessman Maurício Borges Sampaio, who acted as Atlético Clube Goianiense’s vice-president up to 10 days before Oliveira’s murder, was arrested in February this year accused of having ordered the killing. He denies having any link to the crime. Days before being killed, Oliveira went on air to strongly denounce Atlético’s management for the team, after poor results on the pitch led to the club’s relegation […]
Brazil has been caught up in a fresh controversy over attempts to curb online criticism of politicians. This time, the main players are tech giant Google and the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house in the country's congress. Brazil is already one...