Violence against Journalists in Colombia

Smeets, Marylene, Nieman Reports

Impunity surrounds these crimes.

Nothing more clearly illustrates the daunting dangers Colombian journalists face than the number of their colleagues who were killed over the past decade as a result of their work: 34, according to research by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). This figure is unequalled by any country in Latin America; worldwide it is exceeded only by Algeria, where 58 journalists were killed in reprisal for their work over the same span of time.

With the continuing escalation of the nearly four-decade conflict that pits two major leftist guerrilla groups against the army and right-wing paramilitary forces, and with the peace process largely moribund, all warring factions are targeting journalists in efforts to control information. Over the last year, CPJ documented three cases of journalists killed in reprisal for their work. Numerous others were assaulted, threatened and kidnapped. Many fled into exile.

The shocking attack on Jineth Bedoya Lima [See Bedoya's essay about reporting in Colombia on page 8] illustrates the frightening challenges Colombian journalists must deal with. On May 25, 2000, Bedoya, a reporter at the Bogota daily El Espectador, was kidnapped, beaten and raped. The attack apparently occurred in retaliation for the paper's coverage of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), the leading right-wing paramilitary group. During her ordeal, Bedoya's assailants told her they planned to kill three other journalists, including Ignacio Gomez, the head of El Espectador's investigative unit. [See Gomez's story on page 9.] The day before Bedoya was attacked, a man whom Gomez recognized as a member of the paramilitary forces tried to follow him into a taxi. Gomez fled the country less than a week later, after police told him that they could not provide protection.

All sides in the conflict are acutely sensitive to how they are portrayed in the media, and all have resorted to violence to try to receive favorable coverage. The right-wing paramilitaries are the worst offenders, but journalists have plenty to fear from leftist guerrilla organizations as well. In 2000, CPJ documented numerous kidnappings by Colombia's largest rebel groups, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN); these acts of intimidation were carried out in efforts to influence the journalists' work.

During the inauguration of peace negotiations in a guerrilla-controlled hamlet at the end of January 2000, FARC leader Manuel Marulanda told reporters that their bosses had been unfair to the FARC and would be made to pay. A prominent television personality, Fernando Gonzalez-Pacheco, fled the country in March after receiving kidnap threats from the FARC. A week later, Francisco "Pacho" Santos Calderon, the editor of Colombia's largest daily newspaper, El Tiempo, also went into exile after receiving credible reports of death threats and experiencing a suspected attempt on his life. [See Santos's article on page 12.] According to one of Santos's colleagues, the would-be assassins were hired by the FARC. Santos had founded a nongovernmental anti-kidnapping organization after Medellin drug cartel leader Pablo Escobar kidnapped Santos in 1990 and held him for eight months.

Violent attacks against the Colombian press in recent years were perpetrated largely by warring political …

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Publication information: Article title: Violence against Journalists in Colombia. Contributors: Smeets, Marylene - Author. Magazine title: Nieman Reports. Volume: 55. Issue: 1 Publication date: Spring 2001. Page number: 6. © 1999 Harvard University, Nieman Foundation. COPYRIGHT 2001 Gale Group.

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