(IPYS/IFEX) – During the night of 27 September 2003, unidentified individuals attacked Horizonte 1260 AM radio station, located in Yaracuy state, in the country’s west central region. The details of the attack were provided to IPYS by station manager Félix Morillo. At 3:30 a.m. (local time), a crowd began to throw stones and bottles at […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – During the night of 27 September 2003, unidentified individuals attacked Horizonte 1260 AM radio station, located in Yaracuy state, in the country’s west central region. The details of the attack were provided to IPYS by station manager Félix Morillo.
At 3:30 a.m. (local time), a crowd began to throw stones and bottles at the radio station’s doors, causing severe damage to the main entrance and studios located on the building’s second floor.
Morillo said he did not know who was responsible for the attack, the first ever against Horizonte 1260. “They did not leave pamphlets or graffiti of any kind, nor did they indicate any political affiliation,” he said.
Morillo did not want to associate the attack with any particular political interest and noted that the radio station gives equal treatment to the governing party and the opposition in its news coverage, opinion programmes and advertising.
He recalled, however, that on 13 April 2002, after the coup that temporarily removed President Hugo Chávez Frías from power, at least 500 governing party supporters took over the radio station and broadcast political messages for more than an hour.
Despite the 27 September attack, the station’s owners did not launch a complaint with the state security forces or the Yaracuy Public Prosecutor’s Office.
