PERU A Supreme Court decision overturning a local mayor’s conviction in the murder of a radio journalist alarmed the news media and punctuated a year in which provincial reporters faced threats and attacks from local officials and their supporters. Citing a lack of evidence, the high court ordered the release of Yungay Mayor Amaro León…
UNITED STATES After consuming the press freedom landscape for more than two years, an investigation into the leak of a CIA operative’s name wound down with a whimper. News organizations reported in August that special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald apparently knew from the day his investigation began in December 2003 that then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard…
VENEZUELA President Hugo Chávez Frías, who has outlasted a coup and a recall, swept to victory in the December 3 presidential election amid tense relations with the press. Chávez threatened to withhold licenses from broadcast outlets critical of his administration, while the attorney general quashed coverage of a prosecutor’s assassination amid press reports that exposed…
ALGERIA: 2 Djamel Eddine Fahassi, Alger Chaîne III IMPRISONED: May 6, 1995 Fahassi, a reporter for the state-run radio station Alger Chaîne III and a contributor to several Algerian newspapers, including the now-banned weekly of the Islamic Salvation Front, Al-Forqane, was abducted near his home in the al-Harrache suburb of the capital, Algiers, by four…
FEBRUARY 3, 2007 Posted February 6, 2007 Wilder Jordán, Nuestro Diario ATTACKED Jordán, correspondent for the Guatemala City-based daily Nuestro Diario in the eastern Zacapa province, told CPJ that an unidentified individual aboard a motorcycle shot several times at his unoccupied car. Jordán, who was not injured, believes the attack was retaliation for an article…
New York, January 30, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned by a court order preventing Colombia’s El Heraldo newspaper from publishing follow-up articles to its report alleging links between a company in Barranquilla and paramilitary forces. On January 21, the paper published a joint investigative report with the nongovernmental organization, Fundación Protransparencia, alleging links…
JANUARY 26, 2007 Posted February 8, 2007 Antonio Asalde Lluen, El Guerrero THREATENED Lluen, director of the Casma-based daily El Guerrero, was threatened with death by a local government official after reporting on corruption in the local government, the journalist told CPJ.
New York, January 26, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about the fate of Mexican reporter Rodolfo Rincón Taracena, who has been missing in the southern Tabasco state since Saturday night. CPJ is investigating whether Rincón’s disappearance is linked to his professional work. Rincón, an investigative crime reporter for the Villahermosa-based daily Tabasco Hoy,…
New York, January 25, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Haitian authorities today to fully investigate the murder of photographer Jean-Rémy Badio, who was gunned down outside his home in Port-au-Prince on Friday after receiving several death threats from local gang members. CPJ is investigating whether Badio’s murder is linked to his professional work.…