Colombia

IFEX expresses concern over the Office of the Attorney General’s recent actions, which resulted in the release and re-arrest of the main suspect in the 2000 attack on journalist Jineth Bedoya.

The Foundation for Freedom of the Press considers the decision to end the investigation, after 15 years of impunity, as an enormous step back in the search for justice.

In a meeting with the Committee to Protect Journalists and Foundation for a Free Press, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos pledged to prioritize combating impunity in attacks against the press.

Ana Cristina Restrepo Jiménez, a widely read columnist for the dailies El Colombiano of Medellín and El Espectador newspaper of Bogotá, received a telephone call after she conducted interviews in a neighborhood in Medellín that is dominated by drug gangs.

Reporters Without Borders hails the withdrawal of charges against William Parra, a TV reporter wrongly accused of abetting Colombia’s rebels.

On 14 February 2015, journalist Luis Peralta Cuellar was killed at his home in the department of Caquetá. Peralta was known for his critical journalistic style and he was heard across five municipalities.

The Águilas Negras paramilitary group has given news outlets a deadline of 1 January to leave the cities where they operate, but the government has yet to respond.

Can authorities long known for their ignorance or even complicity in crimes against journalists institute legal measures that produce tangible change?

As well as ’Agencia de Reporteros Sin Fronteras’, the targets of the threats made by the paramilitary group “Bloque Capital – Águilas Negras” were the TV stations Canal Capital and Telesur, and Nelson Arnesto, the creator of the news programme Patio Bonito Al Día.

Journalist Oscar Castaño Valencia had been working on an investigation into the regulation of prostitution by criminal groups, when he was attacked after a source asked to meet with him.

Journalist Gustavo Rugeles has been investigating links between neo-Nazi groups, paramilitaries and politicians for the past three years and has been threatened many times in connection with his coverage of the subject.

On 26 September, the Attorney General’s Human Rights Section confirmed that the May 2000 kidnapping, torture and sexual assault of journalist Jineth Bedoya constitutes a crime against humanity.

Two Colombian journalists are among a group of people threatened by the paramilitary organization “Los Rastrojos” in a hit list circulated on leaflets in the city of Montería, in the northern department of Córdoba.

Amalfi Rosales, a correspondent with Radio Noticias Uno and the newspaper Al Día, has been getting threats for nearly a year. They culminated on 2 September when unidentified gunmen fired three shots at her house.

In an open letter, journalist Javier Osuna talks of the difficulties of being a reporter in Colombia and the need to assign more importance to journalism.

Juan Pablo Gutiérrez, a freelance photographer and indigenous rights defender is the target of death threats from the paramilitary group The Black Eagles who are demanding that he stop working with indigenous peoples and leave Colombia.