Last weekend I spent a couple of days on a course with Mexican journalists in Toluca, just outside Mexico City. The training was put together by Article 19, a non-profit working here in Mexico trying to lobby and protect the rather besieged journalistic community which is under fire from all sides.

You can read my full report here, but here’s an extract:

Raymundo Arellano wears a pair of dog tags around his neck. His name, blood type and next of kin have been indented on the silver plates.

“My greatest fear is that I’ll be killed and they’ll bury me somewhere and no one will recognize my remains,” he says.

Arellano is a Mexican television reporter trying to do his job in a country wracked by drug-related violence. More than 30 journalists have been killed or disappeared since President Felipe Calderon took office in 2006, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists; ten of them in the last year alone.

When Calderon came to power five years ago, he unleashed the Mexican army and police against the country’s drug cartels and organized crime networks – a strategy that has resulted in more than 35,000 deaths so far. Both drug gangs and Mexican officials target journalists reporting on events surrounding organized crime, according to non-profits.

One thing I didn’t write about was a feeling of guilt – guilt that as yet no foreign journalist has been targeted by either organized crime or government officials whilst trying to cover the country’s raging drug-related violence. Meanwhile, Mexican journalists are kidnapped and killed with impunity.

Why?

I asked most of the journalists I interviewed on the course that question, and most of them gave the same answer – that the foreign press don’t cover the “inside-baseball” side of the story, and it’s those details that get local reporters in trouble. In general, the reporting of foreign journalists here (some of which is incredibly insightful, not to mention brave)  puts the drug-related violence in a country-wide context.

That said,  Tracy Wilkinson, head of the Los Angeles Times bureau here in Mexico City, pointed out to an audience during a panel of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) and the American Society of News Editors (ASNE);

“What we’re dealing with – the foreign or international press – is nothing compared to what our Mexican colleagues have to deal with, who are really under pressure, and take risks that – thank god – don’t affect us at the same level.

But, she said, “foreign correspondents have had to radically change how we work in Mexico. Before, we could travel all over without thinking twice about it – now we still travel all over but with military-style planning.”

Violence against media workers in an old problem here in Mexico – you can see some reports I did on the same issue, same course, a couple of years ago here and here. But despite that, the impunity enjoyed by those who commit those aggressions remain. Self-censorship is now commonplace amongst reporters trying to stay alive, whilst drug-related violence that has claimed more than 35,000 lives since 2006 continues to consume the country. With the nation’s army roaming the streets, under the orders of President Felipe Calderon to catch those big bad drug lords, the army too stand accused of human rights violations against innocent civilians. And non-profits say that government officials are equally as responsible for abusing journalists as organized crime networks.

Mexico’s people desperately need quality journalism if they’re to understand what’s going on in this huge terrain. It’s my guess that as general elections approach in 2012, the suppression of reporters is only going to get worse.

You can see a video I produced for Article 19 on this course here.

Image: Mexican journalists enjoy first aid training during a training course on the outskirts of Mexico City in early April 2011. Deborah Bonello / MexicoReporter.com

This post also appeared on the Frontline Club network.

Since 2000, 45 journalists have been killed in Mexico, according to the latest missive on the issue from the human rights body. Those who cover organized crime are especially at risk.

The appeal from the CNDH follows the recent murders of Miguel Ángel Villagómez Valle, editor of the newspaper La Noticia, in Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán state; David García Monroy, columnist from El Diario, Chihuahua; and José Armando Rodríguez Carreón, from El Diario in Ciudad Juárez, in the state of Chihuahua.

The largest number of killings of journalists has been in Tamaulipas, where nine cases were recorded since 2000. Six journalists were slain in Chihuahua, and four in each of the following states: Veracruz, Oaxaca and Michoacán.

The CNDH also refers to the recent attack on the offices of the Culiacán newspaper El Debate earlier this month, which it said was an attack on the fundamental rights of the newspaper’s workers. Two grenades were thrown at the offices in the early hours of the morning of Nov. 17. No one was hurt.

Towards the end of last week, the global non-profit Reporters Without Borders issued a statement appealing to the international community, and especially the United States and Canada, to grant asylum to journalists fleeing Mexico.

Violence against journalists in Mexico has become increasingly intense over the last few years. In 2007, Reporters Without Borders said in its annual report that the country in 2006 was second only to Iraq in dangers for journalists.

Today, the CNDH said that it “deplores…the lack of results from investigations to identify and apprehend those responsible.”

This post was written for La Plaza.

Journalists in Mexico who cover organized crime are often risking their lives. The move from the global press-protection network comes in the wake the murder of Armando Rodriguez, crime reporter on El Diario, who was shot dead in Ciudad Juarez last week, and the problems some journalists are experiencing in attempting to escape Mexico.

Emilio Gutiérrez Soto, a fellow reporter of Rodriguez at El Diario, fled to the United States in June because he was getting death threats, reports Reporters Without Borders. But the non-profit claims that Gutiérrez Soto has been detained in the Texan border town of El Paso since June after entering the United States “in an unauthorized manner – while his asylum request is considered”.

“Gutiérrez has remained in detention despite a recent reminder by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees about the obligation to provide asylum. He could remain there
for several more months as a hearing scheduled for today has been postponed until March.“

Gutiérrez Soto is not the only journalist to have fled Mexico. As we reported yesterday, Jorge Luis Aguirre, director of the news website La Polaka, fled Mexico yesterday with his family to the United States after receiving death threats in his home city of Ciudad Juárez.

Luís Horacio Najera, a correspondent for the national daily Reforma, is currently in Canada, and the managing editor of Reforma, Alejandro Junco de la Vega, went to the United States several months ago for what he said were safety reasons.

Reporters Without Borders said:

“Claudio Tiznado, a reporter with Géneros, a newspaper based in Hermosillo, in the northwestern state of Sonora, requested asylum in Tucson, Arizona, in May 2007 but was unsuccessful and returned to Mexico a few months later.

“Misael Habana had a similar experience. Habana used to co-produce a news programme on the privately-owned national TV station Televisa with Amado Ramírez, who was murdered in Acapulco, in the southwestern state of Guerrero, on 6 April 2007. He requested asylum in Canada but gave up after seeing it was going to take a very long time.”

The area has been cordoned off by the Army.

El Debate is the largest newspaper in Sinaloa and “fairly aggressive in its organized crime coverage”, according to BorderReporter.com. As Tracy Wilkinson reported earlier this year, the city of Culiacán is the birthplace of Mexico’s multi-million dollar drug trade and home to some of the major players in Mexico’s powerful drug cartels.

El Debate is not the first newspaper to be targeted with grenades in Mexico, where attacks against journalists and the media – especially those who cover organized crime – are depressingly frequent. More than 30 reporters have died or disappeared in Mexico since 2000, the group Reporters Without Borders says.

In May last year, Cambio in the Northern State of Sonora closed its doors after two grenade attacks and what its editor said was a failure on the part of the Government to protect its 250 employees. In October 2007, journalists of the Oaxacan newspaper “El Imparcial del Istmo” resigned out of fear for their lives following the killing of three of the newspaper’s employees and repeated threats after the newspaper reported the finding of a grave containing seven corpses.

In February 2006, the offices of El Mañana newspaper in Nuevo Laredo were attacked by men wielding grenades and assault rifles. A reporter was left paralyzed and the paper later announced that it
would cease producing investigative reports on drug trafficking.

Reporters Without Borders says that Mexico is the most deadly country in the Americas for journalists.

This post was written also appeared on La Plaza.

The Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders have both condemned the killing.

The CPJ reports:

An unidentified assailant shot Rodríguez, 40, a reporter for the local daily “El Diario”, at least eight times with a 9mm weapon, according to Mexican news reports and CPJ interviews. Rodríguez was sitting in a company-owned Nissan sedan parked inside his garage at about 8 a.m. when he was shot, local authorities told CPJ. His young daughter, Ximena, who was in the car at the time of the attack, was uninjured. According to Jaime Torres Valadez, the local mayor’s spokesman, the reporter was pronounced dead at the scene.

“We mourn the death of Armando Rodríguez and offer our deepest condolences to friends and family,” said Carlos Lauría, CPJ’s senior program coordinator for the Americas. “The unprecedented wave of violence against the Mexican press must be halted immediately. We urge state and federal authorities to promptly investigate Rodríguez’s slaying and bring those responsible to justice. Mexico needs to break the cycle of impunity in crimes against journalists.”

According to BorderReporter.com:

The motive is unknown except that Rodriguez covered the crime beat for his newspaper, El Diario de Juárez, for more than a decade.

The newspaper is staying silent about the murder thus far, but this is what my colleagues in Juárez and some law enforcement sources in Texas report this morning:

Rodriguez had actually fled recently to El Paso recently; I don’t know if he used his cross-border visa or had sought political asylum. But believing he was safe, he returned to Juárez and resumed work at the newspaper. A threat came in over the past few weeks, I’m unclear on the date still, and the newspaper sought police protection for him but none was forthcoming.

Rodriguez is the second news reporter at El Diario to flee Mexico for the United States. A second, whom I will not name for security reasons, is currently living in the United States under asylum.

Five journalists have now been murdered in Mexico this year and one has gone missing, says Carlos Lauria with the The New York-based, Committee to Protect Journalists.

The Attorney General’s office, which represents a special office set up to investigate crimes against journalists in Mexico (Fiscalía Especial para la Atención de Delitos Contra Periodistas, FEADP), issued the arrest warrants. The names of those who are under arrest warrant have not been published, and it is not known whether Mario Marin, the governor of Puebla who was implicated in the illegal arrest of Cacho, is amongst them.

Cacho was arrested by Puebla police on December 16th 2005 in her home state of the Yucatan following the publication of her book called Los Demonios Del Eden, in which she alleged the Cancun-based businessman Jean Succar Kuri was the leader of a pedophile ring that involved luring young and poor girls to his home so that he and his friends could have sex with them.

She also linked a number of state officials and other businessmen to the shady network, and Marin was implicated in her illegal detention. Phone conversations revealed by the daily La Jornada and broadcast on W Radio between Marin and local businessman Kamel Nacif, a friend of one of the architects of the child sex ring Jean Succar Kuri, featured the governor and the company boss joking that Cacho should be raped during her transfer.

On the tape Nacif Borge calls Marin “my precious governor,” and Marin calls the businessman “my hero” as the two celebrate Cacho’s arrest.

After a brief detention, Cacho was released and became the first woman in the country to file a federal suit against a governor, district attorney and a judge for corruption and attempted rape in prison. But Cacho’s efforts for justice at the Supreme Court of Mexico proved disappointing, after the Court rejected a report by its own Commission that found that Marin and 29 of his officials had conspired to violate Cacho’s rights.

Marin walked.

Cacho later alleged that some of the Supreme Court judges – who 48 hours earlier looked as though they were going to vote in her favor, had been paid off by Marin’s lawyers.

It now appears that Cacho could be dealt justice through the FEADP, a special legal team put in charge of investigating crime against journalists during the Fox Presidency. The Office has largely been regarded as toothless until now, but arrest warrants for the public employees are in front of a district judge. It is not clear what the next step will be – but stay tuned.

The news coincides with a fact finding mission taking place in Mexico this week which is a joint initiative by a number of domestic and international NGOs.

According to a press release from Article 19: ‘The central objective of the mission is to evaluate the situation of freedom of expression and press freedom in regions in the north and south of the country, these include Oaxaca, Guerrero, Michoacán, and Sonora. The aim is to provide support to local media organisations/unions, and to raise awareness about the risks that media workers face. In addition it will, by means of the establishment of a dialogue with federal and state authorities, and other bodies relevant for the full exercise of freedom of expression, promote exploration of the viability of remedies/instruments created to address the issue.’

Go the press centre for Article 19 to see the release.

The organisations participating include ARTICLE 19, International Media Support (IMS), Asociación Mundial de Radios Comunitarias (AMARC), Rory Peck Trust Fund, Reporters Without Borders, International Federation of Journalists, International News Safety Institute (INSI), Committee for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ), Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa (Colombia), International Press Institute (IPI), Inter Amercan Press Association (SIP), Open Society Institute (OSI) and UNESCO.

OAXACA — At the beginning of the month, two presenters for a community radio station in San Juan Copala, Oaxaca state, in southeast Mexico, were shot dead when traveling on the highway connecting Joya del Mamey to Putla de Guerrero.

The dead, Felicitas Martínez Sánchez and Teresa Bautista Merino were both in their early twenties and worked for La Voz que Rompe el Silencio (The Voice That Breaks the Silence), a community radio station run mainly by young adults and teenagers from the Triqui indigenous community.

Four other people were wounded in the attack, which took place between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m. (local time) on 7 April 2008, according to information released by the Centro de Apoyo Comunitario Trabajando Unidos A.C. (CACTUS) – a civil society organisation that works in the area.

CACTUS human rights work coordinator Omar Esparza indicated that “the group had gone out to do reporting and interview people. They were indigenous reporters carrying out a task assigned by the community authorities.”

The attack was condemned by Reporters Without Borders, Article 19 and AMARC – the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters. All three NGOs called for a clarification of the events of that day, protection of the survivors, punishment of the perpetrators and an end to impunity for people who commit crimes against journalists in Mexico in a joint statement.

PUEBLA – In the same week, the launch of Lydia Cacho’s book was obstructed in the city of Puebla, the capital of the state of the same name, which is governed by Mario Marin – the state governor implicated in her book about a paedophile ring in Cancun.

Cacho, who launched the book ‘Memorias de una infamia’ in Mexico City earlier this year (pictured), launched the book in Puebla on April 5th. Prior to its launch, a billboard advertising the book was taken down by state police.

Norma Bautista, communications chief for Random House Mondadori publishers, told “El Universal” newspaper that, on 14 March, her company erected a billboard in the city of Puebla to advertise the book’s publication.

“We were later told that the advertisement had been removed because the structure was unsafe,” said Bautista. However, the billboard structure remained in place; only the advertisement had been removed and replaced with another.”

El Universal also reported that Cacho alleged Marin launched a campaign of intimidation prior to the launch of the book.

SINALOA – Finally, the conviction of four men for the 2004 murder of photographer Gregorio Rodríguez Hernández was welcomed by the Committee for the Protection of Journalists.

Rodríguez was gunned down in front of his family in a cafeteria in the town of Escuinapa on November 28, 2004. The 35-year-old photographer worked for the Mazatlán edition of the newspaper El Debate.

Armed men approached Rodríguez when he was eating with his wife and sons, 3 and 6, and opened fire, according to The Associated Press and local news reports. He was shot at least five times, news reports said.

But freelance journalist and organized crime reporter Michel Marizco, who covers the Mexican border with the United States through his site BorderReporter.com, sees it another way.

He says, in a column for The News here in Mexico which is also published here on his website, that the 11 years sentences handed down to former police chief Abel Enríquez Zavala and the three hitmen working for police at the time – Pedro Salas Franco, Francisco Pineda Sarmiento, and Elías Álvarez González – is a sad reflection of how Mexico has receded over the last few years.

“Rodriguez is dead but I hope his case stays alive. First, because 11 years for a pre-meditated murder is inexcusable. Secondly, his killing shows that there is no battle being waged between good and evil, security forces versus criminals. The line between the two blurred long ago.

“It’s now indistinguishable.”

Identifying himself as José Sánchez, the caller asked to speak to the publisher “for personal reasons.” The call was transferred to the editor, who said Castro was in a meeting and unavailable. The caller replied: “Tell her she has information, she knows what I am talking about, and if she publishes it, she will be killed.”

A few moments later, the editor took another call from someone identifying himself as Gumercindo Hernández, who said that he had been “nice until now” but “the situation could soon change” if his demands were not heeded.

According to NGOs, the aim of the threats is in fact coming from the authorities themselves. Reporters Without Borders says ‘the aim of the threats appears to have been to deter the newspaper from reporting that a local police inspector helped the town’s former police chief to evade arrest.’

The story behind the threats was revealed in an editorial in the newspaper yesterday: local police inspector Pedro Angel Márquez allegedly helped the town’s former police chief, Alvaro Mendoza Morales, to evade arrest. Mendoza is wanted for the 16 March shooting of a traffic policeman, Héctor Rafael Sorcia Reyes, who tried to take him to the police station when he was caught driving while drunk.

A complaint has been filed with the Veracruz state prosecutor’s office naming Márquez as main suspect in these threats. The newspaper also promised in yesterday’s issue that it would not let itself be intimidated. “We will not be silenced, neither now nor in the future.”

Local media, Governor Fidel Herrera Beltrán and the National Commission for Human Rights have also come out in support of the newspaper, which unlike some of its contemporaries, is as yet refusing to be silenced by the threats.

The development illustrates the role that the Mexican state authorities play in the repression and intimidation of journalists in the country.

In February this year, the car of Mexican journalist Estrada Zamora was found empty on the side of the road in the southern state of Michoacán with its engine running. Zamora was not inside and has not been seen since.

Click on the link above to read the full article, published today by Index on Censorship.