Mexican President Felipe Calderon says his government will put in place a new plan aimed at protecting journalists, increasingly the target of drug-related violence in battles that have pitted Mexican security forces against drug traffickers. The AP reports that, according to a statement released by Mr. Calderon’s office Wednesday, the new initiative includes “an early warning system in which reporters would have immediate access to authorities when threatened, the creation of a council to identify the causes behind attacks on reporters, legal reforms, and a package of ‘best practices’ in journalism.”
The announcement comes after the murder of a photojournalist working for the Juarez’s El Diario last week and follows a Wednesday meeting between the Mexican President, the Inter-American Press Association and the Committee to Project Journalists (CPJ). According to Gonzalo Marroquin, the Inter-American Press Association’s vice president, the Mexico strategy resembles a similar initiative adopted in Colombia at the peak of that country’s struggle with drug-related violence. In Colombia that included “moving threatened journalists out of the areas where they worked” and “not adding bylines to stories on Colombia's cocaine business.”
In a press release about the Wednesday announcement, CPJ quotes President Calderon:
“We categorically reject any attack against journalists because this is an assault against democratic society. It pains me that Mexico is seen as one of the most dangerous places for the profession.”
The US-based media watchdog also says Mexico’s new journalist protection measures will include efforts for new legislation that “make attacks against free expression a federal crime.” [CPJ: “In 2008, the president proposed a Constitutional amendment that included federalization of anti-press crimes, among other things, but the measure stalled in Congress.”] According to Joel Simon, CPJ’s executive director and a participant in yesterday’s meetings with the President Calderon:
“President Calderon showed his deep commitment to press freedom issues by spending an hour and half with our delegation openly discussing the challenges and pledging a robust response. We commit to doing our part to ensure that Mexican journalists can work freely and safely in the face of this perilous environment.”
For more on violence against journalists in Mexico – particularly the response of El Diario de Juarez to last week’s brazen killing – the AP, the Investigative Fund, and In These Times have new reports. The latter interviews Charles Bowden, author of Murder City: Ciudad Juárez and the Global Economy’s New Killing Fields. The former says the UN and OAS have characterized El Diario’s powerful Sunday editorial (here and here) as a potential turning point for Mexicans, “pushing them to recognize the corrupting forces on freedom of expression in a country considered the most dangerous in the Americas for journalists.” Or, in the words of another Juarez-based newspaper editor who has limited his coverage of organized crime since his car was torched in 2005:
“[The editorial] is something unusual. I see it as a call to the people, a call to awaken society to what's happening in our country.”
A total of 65 news workers have been slain since 2000, according to Mexico's National Commission on Human Rights – at least 22 (plus7 disappearances) have been in the last four years alone.
To a round-up of other stories:
· Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has apparently taken the liberty of making several “modifications” to his country’s constitution while legislators vacationed last week. The full story from the CS Monitor which says the Ortega government printed new copies of the constitution last week, adding an article that was taken out of the document some 20 years ago. Here’s the CS Monitor:
“According to the resurrected second paragraph of Law 201, supreme court judges, electoral magistrates, and other public officials can remain in office beyond their term limits until new officials are appointed. The problem is, according to legal analysts, that the law was a ‘transitory’ provision in the 1987 Constitution and expired more than two decades ago. That's why it wasn't included in the current Constitution, which was printed after the reforms of 1995.”
Ortega’s FSLN contends that the re-inclusion of the article will ensure government stability and prevent “anarchy.” The opposition doesn’t quite see it that way. They argue it’s all part of Ortega’s bid for re-election, prohibited under the current constitution.
· With more on Venezuela before Sunday’s legislative vote, the Washington Post’s Juan Forero has his take on the Venezuela’s opposition, focusing on one time Chavez ally-turned-opponent, Lara Governor, Henri Falcon. While not on the ballot this weekend, Falcon is characterized by the paper as attempting to “carve out” a political space for “moderate leftists seeking an alternative to Chavez.” In particular, Falcon says his attempt has been to connect with Venezuelans who have tired of political polarization and confrontation. According to the Post, Falcon’s recently created party, Fatherland for All, could become a “kingmaker” in the next Congress, “if more traditional and conservative opposition also advance” after Sunday’s elections. More again from the Miami Herald as well, focusing on the issue of “voter disillusionment.”
· From the Global Post, a good report from John Otis on the legacy of Alvaro Uribe and the “rocky” start to the ex-Colombian president’s retirement. He’s been met with protests at Georgetown University, where he was controversially given a post as a distinguished scholar for the year. Meanwhile, in Colombia, “nearly a dozen of Uribe’s former advisers are under investigation for abuse of power and could end up in prison.” Nevertheless, Otis writes that pockets of significant popularity at home keep Uribe thinking about a potential run for mayor of Bogota next year.
· More on Colombia from Colombia Reports which says 26,000 homicides have been identified through the country’s Justice and Peace Process thus far. During a radio interview this week, the president of the National Reparation Commission, Eduardo Pizarro said that “The results of the application of the Justice and Peace law reveal that 26,000 murders have been identified, 44,000 crimes confessed, and 3,000 bodies discovered in mass graves, of which 1,000 bodies have been returned to their families.”
· President Barack Obama announced a new US foreign aid policy at the UN General Assembly Wednesday. In the words of the White House it will “target U.S. assistance at a select group of countries to help transform them into the next generation of emerging economies.” What might that mean for Latin America? Potentially a loss in USAID money and attention. The agency’s head Rajiv Shah tells the Washington Post that USAID plans to “move staff from Eastern Europe and Latin America to countries such as Ghana, Malawi and Bangladesh, which are becoming bigger priorities.” A bit more on the new foreign aid strategy from BBC Mundo. Latin American News Dispatch has more on the central position the UN Millennium Development Goals have taken at UN meetings this week, particularly a lack of progress made in fighting poverty. Also, an interesting speech by Venezuela’s ambassador to the UN, Jorge Valero, on what he calls his country’s “alternative” path toward achieving UN Millennium Development Goals.
· From Just the Facts, the Congressional Research Service says the US is now Latin America’s third largest arms provider, behind Russia and France.
· The Wilson Center has a new working paper out on the entry of Mexican black tar heroin into the Eastern US.
· From Argentina, the Wall Street Journal says criminal charges have been filed by the government against executives of the country’s two leading dailies, Clarin and La Nación. The government has accused the executives of human-rights violations, “saying they colluded with Argentina's 1976-1983 dictatorship to force the Graiver family to sell the company against their will.”
· With poll numbers. Dilma Rouseff still appears headed to a first round victory in Brazil, despite the recent corruption scandal within Lula da Silva’s government. Meanwhile, in Peru, Keiko Fujimori has emerged as the new favorite for 2011 presidential elections. In a full field, Fujimori has a 24 percent approval rating, followed by former Lima mayor Luis Castaneda with 19 percent, according to a poll by Ipsos Apoyo. Third is Alejandro Toledo, president from 2001 to 2006. And in fourth is the runner-up in the 2006 Ollanta Humala, with 14 percent.
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