South America

Reporters Without Borders shares the concern that the Chilean Union of Photographers and Cameramen has expressed about the possibility of more violence against media personnel by the security forces, especially the carabinero militarized police, during the large protests that are expected to take place today and tomorrow in response to calls from the student movement.

Reporters Without Borders shares the concern that the Chilean Union of
Photographers and Cameramen has expressed about the possibility of more
violence against media personnel by the security forces, especially
carabineros militarized police, during the protests that are expected
to take place today and tomorrow in response to calls from the student
movement.

The broadcasts of TV and radio stations owned by Norte Visión Satelital, a media company based in the northern city of Salta, have been seriously disrupted by the deliberate destruction of an antenna by persons unknown on 3 October. Other regional broadcast media have been affected by this act of sabotage, the fourth against the company since the start of the year.

Reporters Without Borders urges the Chilean congress to reject a government
bill which, in response to a ninth-month-old wave of protests by students
and others,
would violate basic rights by criminalizing the expression of opinions in
public. It also contains disastrous provisions for journalists covering
protests.

In the Week of Nonviolence in Mar del Plata, there was a debate on “Violence and Media. Contributions for a more inclusive communication”. Pressenza’s experience and contribution in the construction of an agenda relating to nonviolence was displayed, in contrast to the constant violent look emitted by the major media in Argentina.

Facing clear headed new generations of Chileans and secondary school and university students showing strong political wit after negotiations which were supposed to let the government ignore the strikers’ demands broke down yesterday, today Chile’s militarized carabineros (police) anticipated the protests by carrying out the most brutal repression.

Reporters Without Borders is concerned about apparent foot-dragging in the investigation into the radio journalist Vanderlei “Wanderley” Canuto Leandro’s murder on 1 September in Tabatinga, a border town in the northwestern state of Amazonas. Canuto had accused mayor Samuel Beneguy in May of threatening him in connection with his work.

Reporters Without Borders calls on the Peruvian authorities to give clear evidence of a determination to combat impunity after the second murder of a journalist in Peru this year. Shot by masked gunmen near his home in the northwestern city of Casma on 7 September, TV journalist Pedro Alfonso Flores Silva died of injuries to the liver and colon yesterday.

Reporters Without Borders calls for the revision or withdrawal of the charges against Leocenis García, the editor of the weekly Sexto Poder, and Dinorah Girón, its publisher, in connection with a satirical photomontage published on 20 August, especially as they are inconsistent with a judge’s decision this week to lift the ban imposed on the weekly the day after it appeared.

Far from being keen on the obituary sections covering most of the communicative space in the media sphere, I think it is essential to throw light on the root causes from which most criminal activities come from today. This is precisely what the following note, published here in full, is dealing with.