The Inter American Press Association condemned the attack on a television station and threats against a newspaper, which "seek to intimidate the activity of journalism."
This statement was originally published on en.sipiapa.org on 7 October 2022.
The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) condemned the attack on a television station and threats against a newspaper in Ecuador, which “seek to intimidate the activity of journalism.” The organization called on the authorities to promptly investigate these acts of violence to identify and prosecute those responsible.
Security cameras captured two individuals on a motorcycle when they shot at the access door to the RTS channel in the city of Guayaquil, Guayas province, early Friday morning. The perpetrators of the attack also left in front of the channel’s offices a pamphlet signed by “La Nueva Generación”, an apparent reference to one of Mexico’s drug trafficking cartels; the pamphlet contained death threats against the editor of the newspaper Extra, Galo Martínez Leisker, and the newspaper’s vendors, in addition to “prohibiting” its sale in Guayaquil and the cities of Esmeraldas, Machala, and Cuenca.
IAPA President Jorge Canahuati and the Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information chairman Carlos Jornet condemned “these acts of violence that seek to intimidate journalistic activity and provoke self-censorship.”
Canahuati, president of Grupo Opsa, of Honduras, and Jornet, editor of the newspaper La Voz del Interior, Argentina, said that they received complaints about “the intimidating increase in the presence of Mexican drug cartels in Guayas, and the insecurity suffered by journalists in that area of the country.”
The IAPA officers stressed that, as established in the Declaration of Chapultepec, a decalogue on the principles of freedom of expression and the press in a democracy, “pressure, intimidation, violence of any kind and impunity for aggressors severely restrict freedom of expression and the press.” Therefore, “these acts must be promptly investigated and severely punished.”
