Foundation for Press Freedom – FLIP

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 13 November 2002, at approximately 11:15 p.m. (local time), a bomb placed inside a vehicle exploded in front of the RCN radio station studios in Cúcuta. Four individuals, including a police officer, a security guard and two local residents were injured and there was material damage to some of the surrounding buildings. […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 15 October 2002, an “El Colombiano” news crew was detained by men who identified themselves as members of the Cacique Nutibara Block, from the paramilitary Cordoba and Urabá Rural Self-Defense Forces (Autodefensas Campesinas de Cordoba y Urabá, ACCU). “El Colombiano” is the newspaper with the highest circulation in Medellín. The incident occurred […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 16 October 2002, police officers at Palonegro Airport in Bucaramanga (Santander), in north-eastern Colombia, assaulted Javier Orlando Mantilla, a journalist with Productores de Television (PTV) and Colmundo Radio, and PTV camera operator Edison Figueroa Benítez. The incident occurred as the journalists were preparing to cover the Atlético Bucaramanga soccer team’s trip to […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – The following is an 11 October 2002 FLIP press release: Report on press freedom violations, September 2002 The Foundation for Press Freedom (FLIP) has released a report on press freedom violations in September 2002. The report analyses the press freedom situation in Colombia. FLIP’s Network of Alerts and for the Protection of Journalists […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 14 October 2002, a group of journalists and camera operators from several media outlets was the target of gunfire while covering confrontations between police and urban militias in the Comuna 13 neighbourhood, west of Medellín. The bullets struck only a few metres from where the journalists were located. All of them escaped […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 1 October 2002, workers belonging to Sintraemcali – the union for the public service company Emcali – assaulted Ricardo Chamorro, a photojournalist from the daily “El Caleño”. The incident occurred while the journalist was covering clashes between union members and public security forces in Cali, southwest Colombia. The workers had launched a […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 20 September 2002, Barranquilla Mayor Humberto Caiafa refused to grant an interview to Myriam Peña, a journalist with the radio programme “Atlántico en Noticias”. The mayor said that the programme “did not report objectively” on the Barranquilla municipal government’s administration. The city of Barranquilla is located on Colombia’s northern coast. The incident […]

(FLIP/IFEX) – On 16 September 2002, the seventh judge of the Bogotá Specialised Court stated that he would not be able to rule on the case of journalist Jaime Garzon’s assassination, which occurred on 13 August 1999 in Bogotá. Subsequently, the case will be moved out of the jurisdiction of the specialised court, which tries […]