JOURNALISM IN THE AMERICAS Blog
U.N. urges Honduran government to protect journalists
Human rights experts from the United Nations urged the government to take urgent measures to protect journalists in Honduras, where seven media workers have been assassinated since March 1, the AFP and EFE news agencies report. Read more »
Fired journalist reports censorship and wrongdoing in purchase of Peruvian TV channel
Beto Ortiz, a well-known local media figure, was dismissed from Frecuencia Latina (Channel 2) for “editorial differences,” and his column in Perú21 has been discontinued. In an interview with Dedomedio magazine, the journalist claims that his departure from both media is a way to censor him for his "impertinence" in reporting irregularities in the transfer of ownership of América TV (Channel 4) to the media groups of El Comercio and La República during the administration of President Alejandro Toledo. Read more »
Canada’s journalists can’t always protect sources, Supreme Court rules
Journalists in Canada have no constitutional right to guarantee their sources' confidentiality, the nation’s highest court ruled. In a landmark decision, the court ruled 8-1 that journalists can offer sources protection, but if prosecutors later demand to know the identity of those sources, the courts will decide the merits of those promises on a case-by-case basis, Reuters reports.
"No journalist can give a secret source an absolute assurance of confidentiality," the judges ruled Friday. Read more »
Newsweek up for sale as newsweeklies lose influence
For several generations, Time and Newsweek magazines competed to define the U.S. news agenda. But this week's announcement that the Washington Post Co. plans to sell Newsweek suggests that the era of weekly news magazines is reaching an end, Stephanie Clifford writes for The New York Times. Read more »
Pentagon bans four reporters from covering trials at Guantánamo
The Pentagon has barred four reporters—three from Canada and one from the United States—from covering proceedings at a military tribunal in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, because they published the name of a U.S. army interrogator who testified at a hearing, the Canwest News Service and the Associated Press report. Read more »
Canadian journalists flunk government on sharing information
The watchdog group Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) has released its first Free Expression Review, giving the federal government’s access to information performance a failing grade, the Globe and Mail and Toronto Sun report. Read more »
Argentine government doubles ad spending in 2009
Keeping with recent trends, the federal government increased its spending on advertising from $100 million in 2008 to $210 million in 2009, a pivotal election year for the ruling party, La Nación reports.
The government's decision to publish the figures came after a month of refusing to heed requests for the information, prompting an NGO to seek a court order based on public information access rules. Read more »
IAPA pushes for Brazil to solve two longstanding journalist killings
The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) has presented formal charges to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, regarding two Brazilian journalists whose alleged killers remain unpunished, IAPA reports. Read more »
Brazilian media organizations mull self-regulation
The industry groups for Brazil's biggest media outlets are considering creating a code of conduct to regulate journalism practices, Folha de S. Paulo (gated) reports. Read more »
Senators urge overhaul, or end, of U.S. broadcasts to Cuba
The U.S. government’s Radio and TV Martí broadcasts to Cuba reach fewer than 2 percent of people on the island, suffer from poor editorial standards, and have failed to make a meaningful influence on Cuban society, a U.S. Senate Committee reports (PDF) this week. Read more »
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