Americas

  
In this still from the film 'Presumed Guilty,' Layda Negrete explains how lawyers will prove Antonio Zúñiga's innocence. (Lawyers with Cameras, 2009)

Mexican documentary ‘Presumed Guilty’ finds justice

In the three years since its theatrical premiere, the Mexican documentary “Presumed Guilty” (“Presunto Culpable”) has earned enough headlines to make any film publicist envious. The movie has been banned, disparaged, acclaimed, and the subject of multiple lawsuits. Along the way, it has broken every documentary box office record in Mexico. Now a series of…

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CPJ welcomes convictions in Brazilian journalist’s murder

New York, February 6, 2014–The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes two convictions on Tuesday in the 2012 murder of Brazilian political journalist and blogger Décio Sá and calls on authorities to ensure everyone involved in the crime is brought to justice. Jhonatan de Sousa Silva, who confessed to being the gunman, was sentenced to 25…

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Press freedom deteriorates in Cyberspace, Egypt, Russia

Risk List underlines mass surveillance, fatalities, and censorship New York, February 6, 2014–Mass surveillance programs by the U.S. and U.K., as well as restrictive Internet legislation by various governments and a wave of cyberattacks globally, are among the disturbing developments that have landed cyberspace on the Committee to Protect Journalists’ Risk List, released today.

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Mexican crime reporter abducted in Veracruz

New York, February 5, 2014–Armed assailants today abducted Mexican crime beat reporter Gregorio Jiménez de la Cruz in the town of Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz state, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on the kidnappers to release him immediately.

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Cartoonist sanctioned under Ecuador’s communications law

Bogotá, February 3, 2014- The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the decision by Ecuador’s media oversight agency on Friday to use the country’s communications law to sanction the leading local daily El Universo over a critical cartoon. The agency fined the daily and demanded that the cartoonist “correct” the cartoon within 72 hours, according to…

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CPJ

Independent media crucial to UN development plan

Today CPJ, along with close to 200 civil society groups from six continents, called on the United Nations to put government accountability and independent media at the center of a new framework for global development. 

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President Barack Obama talks about National Security Agency surveillance on January 17. (AP/Carolyn Kaster)

Obama must chart clearer course on surveillance policy

Tonight President Obama has another opportunity to redirect the country’s out-of-control surveillance programs during his annual State of the Union address. He should seize it. The president’s much-anticipated January 17 speech about U.S. surveillance policy, which came in response to outrage over National Security Agency spying, left much unsaid–and many of the commitments he did…

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Costa Rica must investigate tracking of daily’s phone calls

New York, January 22, 2014–The Committee to Protect Journalists calls for a full investigation into reports that Costa Rican officials secretly monitored the phone records of the San José-based daily Diario Extra as part of a leak investigation.

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A Haitian woman hands out photographs of Jean Lépold Dominique, a journalist who was killed in 2000. (AFP/Thony Belizaire)

CPJ calls on Haitian authorities to act in Dominique murder

New York, January 21, 2014–The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes new progress in the case of Jean Lépold Dominique, a prominent Haitian radio journalist who was murdered in 2000, and renews its calls to the Haitian authorities to bring all those responsible to justice.

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Venezuelan economic controls lead to newsprint shortage

Although nearly all Venezuelan newspapers have websites, many of their readers like to get their news the old-fashioned way: on paper. But that’s getting tougher every day amid a critical shortage of newsprint.

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