Mexico’s Congress this week approved a law for the protection of human rights workers and journalists. The law requires that journalists and media outlets facing attacks because of their work should be offered protection.
The law was unanimously approved, perhaps as a result of the news that on 27 April, two days before the vote, journalist Regina Hernandez was found beaten and strangled in her home in the southern state of Veracruz.
In March, the murder of journalists was made a federal crime. State and municipal authorities are often suspected of being susceptible to pressure from organised crime groups or corrupt local officials. Most of the murders of journalists occur in the interior of Mexico, very often on the US border, where intense drug cartel wars have made the region one of the most dangerous in the world for reporters.
Threats have forced Liberian journalist Mae Azango into hiding after she reported on female genital mutilation (FGM). Azango, who is currently in the United States, faced a backlash after she wrote an article for leading independent daily newspaper FrontPage Africa titled Growing pains: Sande tradition of genital cutting threatens health of Liberian women. The piece forced Liberian officials to declare that the ritual should be stopped, people affiliated with the Sande secret women’s society — which performs FGM — have reportedly threatened the journalist with violence.
Another journalist was killed this weekend in the southern Mexican state of Veracruz. The body of Regina Martinez, a reporter for the political weekly magazine Proceso was found in the bathroom of her home in the city of Xalapa with signs of heavy blows and strangulation.
Martinez is the fifth journalist in Veracruz to be slain in the past 18 months, an ongoing battle between the Zetas drug cartel and members of the Chapo Guzman Sinaloa Cartel has contributed to a spiral of violence and corruption. Other journalists killed in the last year include Noel Lopez Olguin de Noticias de Acayucan, Miguel Angel Lopez, Misael Lopez Solana and Yolanda Ordaz of the newspaper Notiver. No one has been convicted or arrested in these cases.
Martinez was a Procesco reporter for more than a decade and she frequently wrote about drug trafficking.
The last story she filed for the magazine was about the arrest of nine police officers in the municipality of Tres Valle for alleged ties to organised crime. Martinez is the first Proceso reporter to be killed since the magazine was founded 36 years ago. People took to social networking sites to express their outrage over the murder and demand answers.
The latest murder will undoubtedly trigger a chilling effect, which will mean even less reporting on drug related violence. In parts of Mexico where organised crime has pushed journalists into silence, reporters and citizens have used social media networks to keep the public informed about violence and corruption.
This won’t happen in Veracruz, the state sent Twitter users Gilberto Martínez Vera and María de Jesús Bravo Pagola to prison on terrorism charges after they tweeted warnings about local drug gang violence. In a recent interview, the now released Martinez Vera described how his 21 days in prison last August destroyed his life. The mathematics professor now only tweets about religion out of fear of facing trouble once more. Both Martínez Vera and Bravo Pagola faced 30 years in prison if convicted on terrorism charges, they were released after an international outcry.
Four citizen journalists have been killed in Syria, despite the recent ceasefire. Ahmed Abdallah Fakhriyeh, Samir Shalab Al-Sham Abu Mohamed, Alaa Al-Din Hassan Al-Douri and Khaled Mahmoud Kabbisho were killed in the last week. Fakhriyeh was shot dead on his way to film the arrival of Syrian army in a the village of Dmeir on 14 April. On the same day Al-Sham, who worked for the Syrian News Network, died shortly after a mortar round hit the building he was filming in on Tuesday. On 17 April, activist Kabbisho was summarily executed after being questioned in the North West of the country. It is reported his head was crushed by a tank. Leading rights activist Al-Douri was hit by a bullet at a roadblock to the North-West of Hama. His body was handed over to his family on Tuesday (17 April), and is believed to show signs of torture.
