(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 26 December 2006 IAPA press release: IAPA URGES COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT TO ACT IN MURDER OF JOURNALIST MIAMI, Florida (December 26) – In a further move in its hemisphere-wide campaign aimed at creating awareness of the impunity surrounding the murder of journalists and bringing the culprits to justice, the Inter […]
(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 26 December 2006 IAPA press release:
IAPA URGES COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT TO ACT IN MURDER OF JOURNALIST
MIAMI, Florida (December 26) – In a further move in its hemisphere-wide campaign aimed at creating awareness of the impunity surrounding the murder of journalists and bringing the culprits to justice, the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today called on Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe to act to have the investigation into the death of journalist Jairo Elías Márquez speeded up.
Hitmen shot Márquez to death on a street in Armenia, Quindío province, on November 20, 1997. He was the owner and editor of the magazine El Marqués, on whose pages he had criticized the actions of local politicians. Nine years after his death, those guilty of the crime have still to be identified and the homicide investigation remains at the preliminary inquiries stage. The State Attorney’s Office says it is seeking new evidence in order to reactivate the investigation.
In the last 19 years, 316 journalists have been murdered in the Americas. Through ads in more than 380 newspapers and magazines throughout the Western Hemisphere and in spots broadcast by a similar number of radio and television stations, the IAPA is inviting the general public to go to the Web site http://www.impunidad.com and join its campaign dubbed “Let’s Put an End to Impunity” in cases of the murder of journalists.
The initiative, funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, is part of a program that also includes investigative reporting, training for reporters working in hazardous environments and the monitoring of the state of press freedom in the Americas.
