Americas

Guatemala President Álvaro Colom has broached the possibility of declassifying a number of military documents that would shed light on the fate of thousands of Guatemalans who disappeared during the years of internal armed struggle in the country. The president, on February 25 during an event marking National Victims' Day, said his initiative is supported by a number of high-ranking military...

The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) has expressed concern at Nicaragua's commutation of sentences in the cases of the convicted murderers of journalists María José Bravo and Carlos Guadamuz, a development that it claimed "adds to the climate of impunity surrounding freedom of the press in Latin America." According to a report in the Nicaraguan newspaper La Prensa this week, justices of the...

A federal judge in Washington has ordered a journalist to pay up to $5,000 a day if she continues to refuse to reveal her sources, acording to the Associated Press (AP). US District Judge Reggie Walton ruled that former USA Today reporter Toni Locy must pay the fines starting midnight on Tuesday next. The first week she is required to pay $500 a day, $1,000 a day for the second week and $5,000 a...

Two years after a court imposed a news blackout on a terrorism case that includes charges of a plot to storm Canada's parliament, several media organisations have asked an appeals court to lift ban. Lawyers for the Associated Press (AP), the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, CTV television, and the Toronto Star appealed the blackout before Ontario's Court of Appeal earlier this week. They argued...

Four members of the military police have been in connection with the May 2007 murder of Luiz Carlos Barbon Filho, a journalist based in São Paulo state of Brazil. “These arrests constitute the first step in a victory over impunity, one that could not be taken for granted given that those arrested are police officers,” Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) said in a statement. “It is an...

A Canadian court has overturned a landmark 2004 court ruling that recognised journalists have a broad right to protect confidential sources, even in the context of police investigations. The Ontario Court of Appeal's decision last week resurrects a search warrant giving the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) the authority to seize a document from a National Post reporter that went to the heart

Nearly 70 per cent of Americans believe traditional journalism is out of touch, and nearly half are turning to the Internet to get their news, according to a new survey. Two thirds of Americans — 67 per cent — believe traditional journalism is out of touch with what Americans want from their news, a new We Media/Zogby Interactive poll has shown. The survey also found that while most Americans (70...

One of the largest Chinese-language newspapers in the US has been ordered by a federal judge to pay $5.19 million to 200 employees who were denied years of overtime pay and subjected to other labour law violations, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. The Chinese Daily News, based in Los Angeles and New York, must pay more than $3.5 million in damages and penalties in addition to more than $1.5...

The Cuban government should release 22 imprisoned independent journalists in keeping with an international accord protecting free expression that was signed Thursday by Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has demanded. Pérez Roque signed at the UN headquarters the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which provides “the...

The International Federation of Journalists has called on journalists’ unions to support a global day of action on Saturday to renew efforts to combat impunity and to mark the anniversary of a media massacre in Latin America. IFJ has also welcomed today’s launch of special book in Lima marking the 25th anniversary of a tragic incident when eight journalists and a media worker were brutally killed...