Americas

The US Supreme Court has refused to revive a defamation lawsuit against the New York Times by Steven Hatfill, the former government scientist who contended that he was defamed by a series of columns about the anthrax mailings of 2001. The court Monday, according to a Bloomberg News report, rejected Hatfill’s appeal in his suit against the New York Times Co stemming the columns by Nicholas Kristof...

A veteran crime reporter José Armando Rodríguez’s murder has been instrumental in the launch of a nationwide campaign to protect journalists in Mexico. In November 2008, Rodríguez was shot dead at his home in Ciudad Juárez on the Texas border. With the government doing little to protect journalists, ARTICLE 19 and National Centre for Social Communication (CENCOS) have launched their own campaign

Politico and Reuters have joined hands to offer articles to newspapers and sell advertising on the papers' websites, the New York Times has reported. Politico recently began offering papers a limited number of free articles, and beginning this week the papers that sign onto that service, the Politico Network, will also see the stream of daily output from Reuters and choose up to 10 articles and 10...

The US military has refused to comply with the Iraqi central criminal court's order to release Reuters photographer Ibrahim Jassam. Maj Neal Fisher, a spokesman for detainee operations, said on December 10 that the US military was not bound by Iraqi court orders and would continue to hold Jassam on the grounds that he posed "a threat to Iraq security." Jassam was arrested at his home by US and...

One of Haiti's best known journalists, Joseph Guyler C Delva, has been sentenced to a month in prison by a Port-au-Prince criminal court for defaming a senator, Rudolph Boulos, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. Delva is still free pending the outcome of an appeal. The order was passed on December 10. Boulos sued Delva after he said Boulos had a US passport. This would preclude him from...

Peru President Alan García has indicated that he believes jailed TV presenter Magaly Medina should be released. He told a group of Medina supporters on December 10 that he thought the two months she has spent in prison were "sufficient" and that he would discuss the matter with justice minister Rosario Fernández. The host of a celebrity gossip show on privately-owned ATV, Medina has been serving a...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has expressed concern over the sidelining of journalist Javier Molina of Ecuadorian TV station Cablenoticias, which has been state-run since July 2008. Molina was the host of the political programme 'Sobremesas de entorno'. The journalist received three warnings from the new government-appointed management after the station was taken over, ordering him to modify his...

The Constitutional Court in Colombia ruled that the government cannot take measures to restrict a journalist's freedom of expression or right to information as a result of its obligation to provide the journalist with protection, the Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa (FLIP) has reported. The ruling came after the court reviewed the case of a journalist who was under government protection as...

One of Brazil's highest federal courts has ruled that a former mayor in the northeastern state of Ceará should be tried before an ordinary court for the 2003 murder of Nicanor Linhares Batista, the owner of Radio Vale do Jaguaribe, a radio station based in the town. The Superior Tribunal of Justice (STJ) passed the order against Maria Arivan de Holanda Lucena, the former mayor of Limoeiro do Norte...

A programme critical of Ecuadorian president, Rafael Correa, was taken off air recently, the Peru-based Instituto Prensa y Sociedad (IPYS) has said quoting delayed reports. Francisco Pinoargotti, director and presenter of Gama TV's programme 'Buenos Muchachos', which includes entertainment, satire and black humor, told IPYS that his programme was cancelled arbitrarily following orders issued by...