Govenment Offers Rewards for Leads in Killings of Mexican Journalists Agence France-Presse
go to original June 13, 2017

STOP THE VIOLENCE. Journalists protest against violence during the commemoration of the anniversary of the murder of Mexican journalist Manuel Buendia at the Angel de la Independencia monument in Mexico City (Alfredo Estrella/AFP)

Mexico offered an $85,000 reward Tuesday for information leading to those responsible for a string of journalists’ murders, after facing criticism for failing to bring the killers to justice.

The list includes four of the five journalists killed in Mexico so far this year, as well as one killed last year and an editor badly wounded in a gun attack last month.

The reward — a maximum of 1.5 million pesos for each case — “will be paid in proportion to the accuracy, usefulness, effectiveness and timeliness of the information provided in locating the attackers,” the attorney general’s office said in a statement.

Mexican journalists often pay a heavy price for covering the bloody wars between the country’s rival drug cartels and the army.

More than 100 reporters have been killed here since 2000, and more than 20 are missing.

Ninety percent of the cases have never been solved. Human rights groups accuse the authorities of indifference — and even involvement in some cases.



The reward offer includes the high-profile case of Javier Valdez, a noted crime reporter gunned down in broad daylight in the violent state of Sinaloa on May 15.

It also includes the cases of colleagues Cecilio Pineda, Miroslava Breach, and Maximino Rodriguez, all killed in 2017, and Sonia Cordoba, deputy editor of the weekly newspaper El Costeno, who was shot and wounded on May 15.

... According to watchdog group Reporters Without Borders, Mexico is the deadliest country in the world for journalists after Syria and Afghanistan.

Read the rest at Journal du Cameroun

Related: The Country's Crime Reporters Face a Grim Choice: Dishonesty or Death in Mexico's Most Dangerous Profession (Bloomberg)

Related: Journalists Bear Invisible Scars of Mexico's Drug War (Agence France-Presse)

Related: Antonio Garza - Hard News: Journalism in Mexico (Victoria Advocate)

Related: Reporter Threatened and Has Part of Ear Cut Off in Mexico's Quintana Roo state (Committee to Protect Journalists)

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