After a period of apparent improvement, journalists in Colombia increasingly are victim of murder and intimidation again, says the Inter American Press Association (IAPA).
“Threats continue to be the main factor of press intimidation,” the journalist organization said in a meeting in the Argentinean capital of Bueno Aires.
The Colombian government is not helping, say the journalists. “stigmatization by members of the government is used as a mechanism to prevent denunciations of acts of corruption.”
According to the international organization, 89 Colombian journalists were subjected to threats in 2009 and two journalists were murdered in the first ten months of this year.
The organization denounced the impunity in cases of killed journalists and claims prosecutors in twenty cases closed investigations into the murders of journalists.
“Aside this there have been arrest warrants against journalists for contempt after not complying to the publication of a rectification after slander accusation.”
The journalist organization’s Freedom of Press committee presented its report during the 65th General Assembly of the IAPA.