In the first six months of 2015 alone, there were 59 documented attacks against journalists in Guatemala, according to a report released last week by the Observatory for Journalists of the Center for Informative Reports about Guatemala (CERIGUA for its acronym in Spanish).

Aileen Ford writes on the Journalism in the Americas blog on the Knight Center website that, “during this brief period, CERIGUA, a national alternative news agency in Guatemala dedicated to investigative reporting and public monitoring, documented multiple types of aggressions against journalists. These included: threats (14), intimidation (10), obstruction of sources (6), judicial harassment (3), as well as physical and verbal assaults, destruction of equipment, and closure of community media outlets”.

“According to CERIGUA’s latest figures, the reported attacks against journalists concentrated in the southwest departments of Guatemala (30), Suchitepéquez (9), and Quetzaltenango (4). Attacks also occurred in the northern departments of Izabal (3), Quiché (3), and Huehuetenango (2). In the majority of these incidents, Guatemalan authorities (12), security forces (9), political parties (7), and hit men (4) were implicated as suspected culprits”.

You can read Aileen’s full article here.

Categories: Human Rights, Violence