(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is an IAPA press release: IAPA calls charge against editor and reporter in Mexico repressive MIAMI, Florida (May 2, 2001) — The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today described as repressive a criminal charge leveled against the editor and a reporter of the Mexico City newspaper Reforma in connection with its […]
(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is an IAPA press release:
IAPA calls charge against editor and reporter in Mexico repressive
MIAMI, Florida (May 2, 2001) — The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today described as repressive a criminal charge leveled against the editor and a reporter of the Mexico City newspaper Reforma in connection with its publication about wrongdoing in city government, describing it as an attack on freedom to report.
The two were charged with criminal libel at the instigation of the former head of the Federal District government, Rosario Robles, who claimed she was defamed by the newspaper’s April 12 report that public funds had gone missing during her administration.
Alejandro Junco de la Vega, the newspaper’s editor and director of the Reforma Group news company that publishes it, and the reporter who wrote the story, Carolina Pavon, were called in for questioning by an official of the Federal Attorney General’s Office and were surprised when they were denied a copy of the charge, which they had a right to. The Reforma Group said it has faced 14 criminal charges, initiated mostly by public officials, in the past four months.
“News-gathering is seriously harmed by attacks such as this in which a journalist faces criminal charges for reporting to the public about matters of general interest,” declared IAPA President Danilo Arbilla, editor of the Montevideo, Uruguay, news weekly Búsqueda. “The systematic leveling of criminal charges against individual journalists and the news media amount to intimidation and a threat to the democratic system.”
Arbilla said that the administration of justice in Mexico was a matter of concern, explaining that the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which will be in charge of investigating the former government official’s complaint, is an agency of the executive branch. “We could therefore be facing an unfair and biased justice that has the power to be both judge and jury,” he said.
Arbilla noted that in 1998 the Organization of American States’ Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) in its annual report on Mexico declared that the Public Prosecutor’s Office monopoly in pursuing criminal proceedings “has led to distortions, abuses and manipulations.” The report recommended changes in this regard within the Mexican legal system.
“Public officials must understand that their accusations against the news media may not serve as pressure to try and change editorial stances. In choosing to enter public service, the officials should be aware that they will be subjected to public scrutiny and criticism, a control that citizens have. It is essential that the press be able to carry out its watchdog role without any kind of hindrance. That is what the courts have ruled in press freedom cases,” Arbilla added.
IAPA advocates the decriminalization of libel, maintaining that the conviction of journalists in criminal court for writing about matters of public interest is too high a price to pay for press freedom and the right to information.
The free-press organization, which represents some 1,300 newspapers and magazines in the Western Hemisphere, also welcomes the repeal of insult laws, which unduly shield officials from the public they serve when in fact their activities should be more transparent than anyone’s and subject to scrutiny.
