(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 31 January 2007 IAPA press release: IAPA URGES BRAZILIAN PRESIDENT TO ACT IN MURDER OF JOURNALIST MIAMI, Florida (January 31, 2007) – In a new action in its hemisphere-wide campaign to create public awareness of the impunity surrounding crimes against journalists, the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today urged […]
(IAPA/IFEX) – The following is a 31 January 2007 IAPA press release:
IAPA URGES BRAZILIAN PRESIDENT TO ACT IN MURDER OF JOURNALIST
MIAMI, Florida (January 31, 2007) – In a new action in its hemisphere-wide campaign to create public awareness of the impunity surrounding crimes against journalists, the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) today urged Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to order a speed-up in the investigation into the murder of the Mario de Almeida Coelho, Jr.
He was a reporter and the general manager of the newspaper A Verdade in Magé, Baixada Fluminense municipality, Rio de Janeiro. Nicknamed Mariozinho, he was shot five times on August 16, 2001. There are signs that his death is connected to his exposures of local political corruption. A man arrested and charged with the shooting is in custody awaiting trial. Another, suspected of having masterminded the murder, was acquitted. The crime continues to go unpunished.
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.
