(IPYS/IFEX) – At around noon (local time) on 19 August 2005, journalist Gino Márquez Álvarez and camera operator Germán Huaroto Parra, working for America Televisión’s “Cuarto Poder” public affairs programme, were assaulted by President Toledo’s brother, Luis Toledo Manrique, the latter’s son and a member of his security team. The assailants also snatched a microphone […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – At around noon (local time) on 19 August 2005, journalist Gino Márquez Álvarez and camera operator Germán Huaroto Parra, working for America Televisión’s “Cuarto Poder” public affairs programme, were assaulted by President Toledo’s brother, Luis Toledo Manrique, the latter’s son and a member of his security team. The assailants also snatched a microphone and the keys to the car that the journalists were in. The incident occurred in the district of Lurín, south of Lima.
Márquez told IPYS that since 15 August he has been working on an investigation about the personal use that the president’s brother has allegedly been making of a state-owned car. According to him, the programme’s mobile unit was about two kilometres from the car in question, when the president’s brother, who was not in that car at the moment, apparently realised that the journalists were following it. Using another car, Toledo stopped the journalists, got out of his car and, without waiting for the journalists to identify themselves, began hitting them. His son and a personal security guard, who were also in the second vehicle, did the same. Huaroto suffered a cut on his eyebrow and Márquez was hit several times on the legs.
The journalists have filed a complaint with the Lurín police precinct.
