Americas

Just a week after radio Línea Directa crime reporter José Luis Romero was abducted in the northern state of Sinaloa, two other journalists were abducted Thursday in Coahuila, another northern state, and one of them, Valentín Valdés Espinosa, was found dead Friday. According to his newspaper, the Zócalo de Saltillo daily, Valdés was found with a warning message pinned to his chest, a practice often...

The news of the abduction of 40-year-old radio journalist José Luis Romero in the northwestern state of Sinaloa has caused shock and anger in a region notorious for being the preserve of the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the country’s leading criminal and drug-trafficking syndicates. A crime reporter for the Línea Directa radio station, Romero was out shopping in the city of Los Mochis on December 30...

A Cameroonian newspaper editor, jailed this month after publishing a book excerpt that alleged sexual activities by President Paul Biya, was convicted on Monday of “insulting the head of state.” Judge Ibrahim Ba sentenced Jean-Bosco Talla, managing editor of the weekly Germinal, to a one-year suspended term and a fine of 3.15 million CFA francs (US$6,800), the paper’s editor-in-chief, Duke...

The weekly Semana has just revealed the existence of an instruction manual for employees of the Administrative Department of Security (DAS), Colombia’s leading intelligence agency, that explains how they should spy on, threaten, intimidate and discredit NGOs, judges and journalists who create problems for the government. The revelation is the latest in a series of scandals implicating the DAS...

José Alberto Velázquez López, owner of the Mexican newspaper Expresiones de Tulum in the southeastern state of Quintana Roo, died late Tuesday after being shot in his car by a gunman aboard a motorcycle, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported quoting local news reports. Mexican authorities must swiftly investigate this crime and bring those responsible to justice...

José Alberto Velásquez López, a journalist and lawyer based in Tulum, in the eastern Mexico state of Quintana Roo, died on the night of December 22 after being shot as he drove home, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. The editor of the Diario Express de Tulum newspaper and a contributor to Canal 30, a local TV station, Velásquez left a wife who is about to give birth and a five-year-old...

Ten members of “Mara 18”, including two women, were arrested in Sopayango, in the San Salvador suburbs on December 16 in connection with the murder of the Franco-Spanish documentary filmmaker Christian Poveda, according to Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). The killing of the photo-journalist, overnight on September 2, 2009, sent shockwaves through the profession. RSF welcomed the commitment of the...

An unidentified gunman shot and killed Colombian journalist Hárold Humberto Rivas Quevedo in the western Valle del Cauca province on the night of December 15, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported. CPJ Thursday called on Colombian authorities to investigate the killing and do everything in their power to bring all those responsible to justice. Rivas, 49, host of...

Radio station owner and presenter José Givonaldo Vieira was shot dead at the door of his Brazilian offices in an act that bore the hallmarks of an execution, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. Two assailants fired five shots from a car at the proprietor of Radio Bezerros who also presented a programme, in Bezerros about 100 km from Recife in the north-east on December 14. He was hit...

Unidentified assailants shot and killed Brazilian media owner and radio host José Givonaldo Vieira on Monday morning in northeastern Pernambuco state, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported quoting local news reports. CPJ called on Brazilian authorities to conduct a thorough investigation into Vieira’s killing and to promptly bring to justice all those responsible...