Journalist Antonio Medrano, the El Universo correspondent in the city of Babahoyo, received threatening phone calls from unidentified persons, warning him that he could be killed.
(Fundamedios/IFEX) – On 4 September 2012, journalist Antonio Medrano, the El Universo correspondent in the city of Babahoyo, province of Los Ríos, received threatening phone calls from unidentified persons. He was warned that “le van a dar el vire”, an Ecuadorian idiom that refers to the action of killing a person.
Medrano declared to Fundamedios that he received two threatening phone calls. The first one at 07:40 a.m. and the second one minute later. “In the first one a person with an Ecuadorian accent said: ‘Antonio Medrano?’ and when I identified myself he added: ‘you f***, we’re going to kill you’. A minute later another person phoned from a different number. He had a Colombian accent and said:’I am Colombian. We’re going to kill you for fooling around with my wife’. This surprised me because I have no dealings with other women,” he pointed out.
According to the journalist, he does not know who the callers may be, but he commented that the calls may be related to his work. Medrano has been a correspondent for El Universo over the past 15 years and has worked on issues related to security, justice and political affairs. The reporter stated that he fears for his safety and his family’s, so he will report the calls to the authorities.
