13 Jul 10 | Index Index, minipost
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.
21 Apr 10 | Index Index, minipost
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.
14 Apr 10 | Index Index, minipost
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)
13 Apr 10 | Index Index, minipost
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.
