2019

Venezuelan authorities released radio journalist Luis Carlos Díaz on March 12, 2019, after detaining him for more than 24 hours, according to news reports.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is investigating whether the Customs and Border Protection Agency inappropriately targeted and questioned journalists and activists. The investigation, announced by CBP on March 6, came after NBC 7 obtained documents showing that the border agency compiled a list of individuals, including at least 10 journalists, for additional screening.

As Venezuela’s political crisis deepens, and the country closes its border with Colombia following violent clashes in late February, CPJ’s emergencies director, María Salazar Ferro traveled to the Colombian border city Cúcuta, with Luisa Isaza, head of protection for the Colombian press freedom group FLIP, and CPJ’s Andes correspondent, John Otis. There, they met with…

On March 30, 2019, police from Lagunillas, a municipality in Zulia state, beat and detained journalist Danilo Alberto Gil, a reporter for Venezuelan news outlet NotiRedVe–which operates on Twitter and Facebook–at around 9:30 a.m., while he was covering an opposition protest in the town of Ciudad Ojeda, according to posts on Twitter by NotiRedVe, local…

Mexico City, April 2, 2019 — Mexican authorities must immediately undertake a swift, credible, and exhaustive investigation into the death of reporter Omar Iván Camacho Mascareño, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Miami, March 29, 2019–Honduran police yesterday raided the Tegucigalpa office of Radio Globo and Globo TV and took the station’s director, David Romero Ellner, into custody to serve a 10-year prison sentence for defamation, according to news reports and local press freedom organization C-Libre. Romero took refuge in the station a few days ago, after…

When Venezuelan military officials detained American freelancer Cody Weddle on March 11, the experience was both frightening and bizarre. Weddle said that agents put a hood over his head and pressed him to reveal sources he had never spoken with. They suggested the reporter was a member of the CIA and would be charged with…

Entering the terms “NSO Group,” “journalists,” and “spying” into a Google search from a workstation in New York City recently produced a sponsored search result at the top of the page. The NSO Group manufactures some of the world’s most sophisticated and high-profile spyware, and its sponsored link invites readers to a slick website touting…

Mexico City, March 22, 2019 — Authorities must immediately investigate an attack on Mexican journalist Hiram Moreno and guarantee his safety, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Moreno, the editor of news website Evidencias, survived a shooting in Salina Cruz, a town in Oaxaca state, on March 20, according to news reports and an…

First as a candidate and now in his first months as president, Jair Bolsonaro has made his disdain for the media crystal clear. Ministers, supporters, and his family members have followed his lead by no longer offering interviews, attacking and blocking critical reporters on social media, and calling them out as “fake news.”