Last week was a busy one for identifying press freedom issues. Freedom House came out with its Map of Press Freedom and Reporters Without Borders released a list of top predators against free media.

Status of world press freedom

Freedom House released its annual Press Freedom survey this week as part of World Press Freedom Day.

And the news is not good. By the Freedom House figures, about 85 percent of the people in the world live in countries where the media are either “Partly Free” or “Not Free” from government interference.

Click here to see the rest of the story.

The top predators against free media

Reporters Without Borders has a great page that identifies the top predators in the world against free and independent media.

Thirty-eight heads of state and warlords sow terror among journalists

The list is the usual group of anti-freedom government types: Hu Jintao, Raul Castro and Kim Jong-il.

There are also the Arab country leaders who are fighting against the Arab Spring uprisings such as Muammar Gaddafi and King Hamad Ben Aissa Al Khalifa in Bahrain.

Iran is so dedicated to controlling the press that it has two identified predators: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Ali Khamenei.

Click here for rest of story.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World.

The Committee to Protect Journalists reports on the latest attack on journalists in Honduras.

Honduran community radio director shot; staff threatened

Franklin Meléndez, 35, who directs the Voz de Zacate Grande community radio station in southern Valle province, was shot on March 13 at a local bar, according to CPJ interviews and local press reports. Meléndez told CPJ that he was approached by two men angered by the station’s critical coverage of local land disputes as he and two colleagues were playing billiards. According to Meléndez, one of the men threatened him and as he was retreating, the second man shot him in the left thigh. A second shot was fired but missed him.

The two assailants, who Meléndez recognized as relatives of a prominent landowner in the region, followed him before the radio director was able to flee on bicycle, he told CPJ. He was later driven to a hospital in nearby Choluteca, where he underwent surgery to remove the bullet.

Rest of report.

The CPJ reports that nine journalists have been killed in Honduras since March 2010. At least three of the killings are tied directly to their work.

The Committee published a special report in July that showed a pattern of negligence on the part of authorities in investigating the killings.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World.

Last week the Honduran deputy security minister Armando Calidonio said that none of the ten murders of journalists in Honduras last year were connected to the victim’s work.

International journalism rights groups disagreed.

The Committee to Protect Journalists claim three deaths were because of the journalists’ work.

Reporters Without Borders have now added their comments: Minister insists no journalist was murdered in connection with their work.

Bottom line: No one really believes that NONE of the deaths were related to journalism.

One of the three journalists killed in 2010 in an apparent connection with his work, Nahum Palacios Arteaga, was gunned down after repeated harassment and threats from military personnel in the Aguán region, where there is a great deal of repression.

In the meantime, the Honduran Committee for Free Expression reports that Esdras López, of Canal 36-Cholusat. was threatened in Tegucigalpa by an army lieutenant-colonel. The station was critical of the coup last year.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World.

I’m not sure if this makes anyone feel any better but the Honduran government issued a statement yesterday (1/5) that the 10 journalists killed in that country last year nine were not killed because of their jobs.

Honduras’ assistant security minister says nine of the 10 killings of journalists that have occurred this year were unrelated to the media workers’ jobs.

Armando Calidonio says nine of the slayings were due to motives unrelated to the journalists’ work, but he did not say what those motives were.

In the past, Honduran authorities have cited motives like personal disputes in some of the deaths.

The Committee to Protect Journalists disagrees. It states that three of the 10 journalists killed last year were targeted because of their work.

• Nahúm Palacios Arteaga, TV Channel 5 (March 14, 2010, in Tocoa, Honduras)
• David Meza Montesinos, Radio El Patio, Radio America, Channel 45 (March 11, 2010, in La Ceiba, Honduras)
• Joseph Hernández Ochoa, TV Channel 51 (March 1, 2010, in Tegucigalpa, Honduras)

FYI, Honduras has the highest murder rate in Central America at 66.8 per 100,000 people. That rate makes it more than 10 times more dangerous than New York City (5.6 per 100,000).

So there may be something to the government’s latest report. Let’s face it. Honduras is not a safe place. But that doesn’t mean the government shouldn’t pursue the killings with vigor.

The New York Times offers a very moving video report on covering the drug war in northern Mexico and how dangerous it is for journalists.

The Most Dangerous Beat: Juárez, Mexico

A while back the Committee to Protect Journalists issued a report – Silence or Death in Mexico — detailing the situation that has mad Mexico a more dangerous place for journalists than Iraq.

The Inter American Press Association continues to run the Impunity Project in the hopes that eventually enough pressure will be brought on governments to actually prosecute the killers of working journalists.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World.

Last week the Committee to Protect Journalists held its annual awards dinner in New York City.

Honored for their work in defending free press were Dawit Kebede of Ethiopia, Nadira Isayeva of Russia, Laureano Márquez of Venezuela and Mohammad Davari of Iran.

The organization also released its annual report.

While the CPJ looks at the whole world, its 201o report selected Somalia, Cuba, Iran, Venezuela, Pakistan, Mexico and Azerbaijan for special attention because of the threats to journalism and journalists in those countries.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World.

A Zagreb court sentenced six alleged gang members to a maximum of 40 years each for the Oct. 23, 2008 killing of journalist Ivo Pukanic.

A prosecutor said the car bombing that killed Pukanic, editor-in-chief of a political weekly Nacional, and his marketing director, Niko Franjic, may have been motivated by Pukanic’s writing about organized crime.

6 sentenced for killing of Croatian journalist

It may have taken a long time, but it good to know that even war-torn Croatia and Serbia can cooperate in a criminal case. Especially a case that brings to justice the killers of a journalist who was doing his job.

Thank you Stephen Colbert:

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World

We have an interesting situation in northern South America.

Desi Bouterse, the former dictator of Suriname, was elected president in fair and free elections and was sworn into office August 12. IFEX calls the election a “breathtaking case of impunity.”

Reporters Without Borders joined in:

We respect the will of the Surinamese people but we cannot forget that Bouterse continues to be charged with the murders of five journalists in 1982, while he was dictator. Even if legal proceedings are suspended for the duration of his presidency, it would be unacceptable it these murders were to go unpunished indefinitely.

Bouterse first came to power in a coup in 1980. He stayed in power until 1987 and again 1990-1991. During his iron-heel rule, Bouterse was accused of violating just about every tenant of human rights.

The journalists — Andre Kamperveen, owner and manager of Radio ABC, Frank Wijngaarde, a Radio ABC reporter, and three print media journalists, Leslie Rahman, Bram Behr and Jozef Slagveer — were among 15 pro-democracy advocates who were slain December 8, 1982 under the presumed authority of Bouterse at the Fort Zeelandia military barracks.

After the execution, soldiers torched the offices of broadcasters Radio ABC, Radio Radika and the daily newspaper De Vrije Stem. Under Bouterse only the state radio SRS and the daily De Ware Tijd newspaper were allowed to operate. Press freedom was dead under the Bouterse rule.

Following the murders, the United States and the Netherlands suspended economic and military cooperation with the Bouterse government.

In addition to his violations of human rights, a Dutch court sentenced Bourterse – in absentia — to 11 years in prison in 1999 on a charge of drug trafficking. He is still facing a 20-year prison term in Suriname if convicted of the 1982 massacre.

While Bouterse claims to have apologized to the families of the Fort Zeelandia victims and to have recognized his political responsibility for the massacre, he has never admitted to being directly involved in their deaths.

Elections were held in 1991 following a series of military run governments. Bourterse’s National Democratic Party, formed a coalition in the parliament in 1992 but was ousted when the coalition fell apart in 1996.

Legal proceedings against Bouterse and others accused of the 1982 executions started in Suriname in 2007. The trial began in July 2008 and continues.

So we now have to ask: Will the trial of Bouterse and those others charged with the execution of journalists continue under the Bouterse government?

Don’t hold your breath. While opposition party leader, Bouterse tried several times to get parliament to enact an amnesty law to cover the actions taken by the government and military during his dictatorship. And now he controls the parliament.

First posted at Journalism, Journalists and the World

National Public Radio ran a great piece this morning that spotlighted how the growing crime syndicate wars in Northern Mexico are affecting the media.

Mexico’s Drug Cartels Use Force To Silence Media

What they reported is what a number of us have been saying for years:

“This record level of violence is really unprecedented,” says Carlos Lauria, head of the Americas program at the Committee to Protect Journalists.

By the organization’s tally, more than 30 Mexican reporters have been killed or have disappeared since President Felipe Calderon declared war on the drug cartels in December 2006.

“We only see these numbers (of murdered journalists) in conflict ridden countries like Iraq and Somalia,” Lauria says.

Groups such as CPJ, the Society of Professional Journalists and the Inter American Press Association have spoken out about the dangers to journalists in the area and against the lack of prosecution of the killers.

And yet with all these killings, reports about the violence in the area that include the dangers to journalists are few and far between.

A UNESCO report earlier this year about the violence against journalists that got little mention in press.

And to be clear, the criticism of the lack of action against those who intimidate or kill journalists is not just us looking out for our own. The violence is an indicator of how powerful the drug gangs have become. Local government has ceased to exist. And even the national government has been intimidated.

Mexican journalist Denise Maeker said late last week, “journalists are not the most important citizens but they do carry out the task of informing, something that cannot be done under these conditions.”

Maeker suspended her talk show in protest over the kidnappings and killings of journalists. (Denise Maerker program in Mexico is suspended)

The reason the drug lords attack the journalists is because they are the ones who have the most credibility when it comes to explaining what is going on. Few believe the local government statements or even the national statements because of the levels of corruption. But the newspapers and broadcasters are seen as honest brokers.

But now, given a choice of death or saying nothing, many journalists are saying nothing.

At least the gangs understood that unlike many of the politicians, the journalists could not be bought off. They had to be threatened or killed to silence them.

The destruction of free and independent media in the border region is continuing and unfortunately few people — including many in our profession — understand what is happening.