(PERIODISTAS/IFEX) – On the afternoon of 21 April 2003, federal police officers assaulted and detained media workers during incidents outside a textile factory in downtown Buenos Aires. Martín Ciccioli, from the television station AMÉRICA’s programme “Informe Central”, was hit seven times by rubber bullets, one of which missed his left eye by two centimetres. Edgardo […]
(PERIODISTAS/IFEX) – On the afternoon of 21 April 2003, federal police officers assaulted and detained media workers during incidents outside a textile factory in downtown Buenos Aires.
Martín Ciccioli, from the television station AMÉRICA’s programme “Informe Central”, was hit seven times by rubber bullets, one of which missed his left eye by two centimetres. Edgardo Esteban, a correspondent for the American NBC network, was detained without cause by police, and avoided arrest thanks to the intervention of his colleagues. “PÁGINA/12” newspaper journalist Miguel Bonasso was held for two and a half hours by officers who kept him and others surrounded at a gasoline station near the factory. Journalists at the scene denounced the police action, which obstructed journalistic coverage.
Some 3,000 people had gathered in front of the factory to protest the eviction of workers, who had continued to keep the plant operating after, in their opinion, its owners had abandoned it.
Ciccioli was fired at while covering the advance of a group of women who worked in the factory, after demonstrators broke through the police cordon.
Esteban was detained as he left a building across the street from the factory, where he had been filming the detention of dozens of people from a balcony. He was made to kneel alongside other people, despite his having identified himself as a journalist. Esteban avoided arrest due to the intervention of journalists from the station AMÉRICA and the presentation of his press credentials.
Bonasso was detained along with some 20 other people at a gasoline station, where the police entered firing their weapons, according to the journalist. He added that he found red shotgun shells in the area, which establishes that lead bullets had been used, although their use is prohibited to quell demonstrations.
In front of the station TODO NOTICIAS’s cameras, the police commissioner in charge of the operation, Carlos Alberto Roncati, defended the officers, saying police had merely responded to the demonstrators’ violent behaviour. With regard to the ill-treatment of the journalists, he said, “The same thing always happens with you. If a journalist was hurt, I’m very sorry.”
PERIODISTAS strongly condemns “the generalisation of these acts of violence, which in recent months have been a recurrent method used against those who merely seek to carry out their task of informing the public.”
PERIODISTAS recalls that in a March meeting with President Eduardo Duhalde, Federal Police Chief Roberto Giacomino and Minister of Justice, Security and Human Rights Juan José Álvarez, Álvarez said, “Abuses that can result in physical or psychological harm, or prevent journalists from fulfilling their function to inform must be duly punished. It has to be made absolutely clear that the government will not tolerate such acts” (see IFEX alert of 18 April 2003). PERIODISTAS believes it is up to the national authorities to prove that these sentiments were not mere rhetoric.
Recommended Action
Send letters of support for the journalists:
C/o Asociacion PERIODISTAS
Fax: +54 11 4300 6149
Send appeals to the minister of justice, security and human rights:
– condemning the police action
– urging him to identify those responsible for violating the journalists’ rights
Appeals To
Juan José Álvarez
Minister of Justice, Security and Human Rights
Tel (direct line): +54 11 4331 8488
Tel/fax: +54 11 4328 2442 / 2730
