Timeline: The 35-year road to justice for murdered journalist Hugo Bustíos Saavedra
When Hugo Bustíos Saavedra was killed in 1988, Peru’s government was embroiled in conflict with leftist guerilla groups, many civil liberties had been suspended, and efforts to seek justice in the journalist’s death seemed futile. CPJ and other press freedom groups unsuccessfully tried for years to pressure Peru’s government to investigate Bustíos’ murder, including by asking…
Peru’s Manuel Calloquispe faces threats and assaults to expose environmental damage from illegal Amazon mining
Manuel Calloquispe has had to face an angry mob laying siege to his house. He’s been called a traitor. He’s been punched and kicked by miners and had his equipment stolen. He once had to duck for cover when someone threw a machete at him. The reason: His decade reporting on the environmental havoc caused…
‘An accumulation of lies’: Right-wing group La Resistencia stokes anti-press fervor in Peru
Journalist Gustavo Gorriti remembers the days — just a few years ago — when people on the streets of Lima approached him to congratulate him for exposing corrupt government officials, drug trafficking mafias, and human rights abusers. A few even asked him to pose for selfies. These days, though, motorists shout insults at him from…
A press freedom crisis unfolds in Latin America
As the number of journalists imprisoned globally for their work climbs to record highs, cases of those behind bars in Latin America remained relatively low. A total of six – three in Cuba, two in Nicaragua and one in Brazil – were in custody for their work as of December 1, according to the Committee…
In five Latin American countries, COVID-19 responses restrict press freedom, CPJ, TrustLaw find
In Bolivia, Brazil, El Salvador, and Peru, emergency measures in response to COVID-19 restricted the media’s capacity to report freely and the public’s ability to access information, including critical information about public health interventions and the pandemic itself, a report by the Committee to Protect Journalists and Thomson Reuters Foundation’s TrustLaw program found. The report,…
Inter-American Human Rights System, campaigns against defamation laws keep journalists from jail in Americas
When a prison guard told Ángel Santiesteban Prats that he would be released from jail on a scorching summer day in July, the Cuban independent writer and blogger decided to ignore him, brushing off the news as a cruel joke. By then, Santiesteban had already spent two years and five months in prison, half of…
Criminal defamation thwarts critical reporting in Ayacucho
When Wilfredo Oscorima, the governor of the southern Peruvian state of Ayacucho, was sentenced in June to five years in prison for official misconduct, independent daily La Calle viewed the ruling as vindication for its vigorous investigations into his administration.
Peru Interior minister under investigation in 1988 journalist murder
Some of Peru’s top government officials, including President Ollanta Humala, are former army officers who spent the 1980s fighting Maoist Shining Path guerrillas. Both sides committed massive human rights abuses, but now one particularly brutal episode is coming back to haunt the Humala administration.
Training can help journalists survive captivity
Two murdered journalists for the Africa service of Radio France Internationale, Ghislaine Dupont, 51, and Claude Verlon, 58, might have had a chance. They were abducted on November 2 in Kidal in northern Mali, but the vehicle their captors were driving suddenly broke down, according to news reports.