Attacks on the Press in 2010 - Committee to Protect Journalists

Americas: Analysisgrip on the region, as organized crime, corruption, and lawlessness spreadover areas of Mexico and Central America. Widespread self-censorship hasbeen the devastating consequence of lethal violence by drug syndicates andcriminal gangs. Dozens of killings and disappearances, bomb attacks, andmultiple threats have led Mexican reporters and news outlets to abandonnot only investigative reporting but basic coverage of crime. In areas whererival traffickers are fighting for turf, reporters have been forced to writewhat the criminals have ordered, or simply stop publishing. “A new wordhas been written into the lexicon of Mexico’s drug war: Narco-censorship,”the Los Angeles Times noted in a story in August.Nowhere was that more evident than in the border city of Reynosa,Tamaulipas state, where the Gulf cartel dictates what can and cannot becovered, CPJ found in a September special report, Silence or Death inMexico’s Press. Bloody cartel warfare went on for months, but news outletsignored the story out of fear. The cartel controlled nearly every aspect ofcity government, journalists told CPJ, but newspapers could not report thisto their readers.As it did in Colombia, violence sparks selfcensorshipin Mexico.“In Mexico, censorship as a result of violence is generating similarconsequences as it once did in Colombia,” Waisbord said. “It’s a failure ofgovernment to guarantee the rule of law.” Self-censorship was pervasiveduring Colombia’s five-decade civil conflict, as journalists and editorsfeared reprisal from all sides. Beginning in the 1980s, at the height of theColombian drug cartels’ power, local media joined forces to investigate anddenounce criminal violence from drug lords. Both violence and self-censorshiphave receded in Colombia in the past decade, although it remainsone of the world’s most dangerous countries for the press.Criminal organizations and impunity have forced the news media intosilence in other Central American countries as well. A wave of deadlyviolence that resulted in the murder of nine reporters in Honduras, at leastthree in direct reprisal for their work, has led to widespread self-censorshipin the local media. Honduran authorities have minimized the crimesand have been negligent in pursuing the killers. In July, a CPJ special reportfound that the government of President Porfirio Lobo was fostering aclimate of intimidation and censorship, allowing criminals to murder withimpunity.77