Forum in El Paso, Texas, to bring together journalists concerned at the situation in Mexico
Miami (December 2, 2010).- With the objective of responding to and coming up with joint actions against the violence in Mexico that so far this year has left 12 journalists murdered, the American Association of News Editors (ASNE) and the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) are to hold a joint Forum of Editors and Publishers of Frontier Newspapers in El Paso, Texas, December 5-6.
IAPA President Gonzalo Marroquín, of Prensa Libre, Guatemala City, Guatemala, and his ASNE counterpart, Milton Coleman, of The Washington Post, Washington, DC, will conduct the opening of discussions among Mexican and United States editors, publishers and reporters with the objective of generating ideas and strategies and coming up with solutions to counter the violence unleashed against the press in Mexico. Also opening the event will be Diana Natalicio, president of The University of Texas at El Paso, where the forum that will bring together more than 100 journalists is to take place.
The panel discussions will focus on the violence in the border areas of each country, self-censorship, the role of the Mexican government, the status of foreign correspondents, and aspects of the two countries’ joint political agenda on combating the illicit drug trade and organized crime.
Among the speakers will be Organization of American States Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression Catalina Botero and representatives of the Mexican government, among them Raúl Plascencia Villanueva, of the Mexican National Human Rights Commission, and Mexican Special Prosecutor for Crimes Against Freedom of Expression Gustavo Salas Chávez. Speakers will also include Pedro Torres, El Diario; Alfredo Quijano, Norte de Juárez; Chris López, El Paso Times; Sandra Rodríguez, El Diario; Adriana Gómez Licón, El Paso Times; Jorge Luis Aguirre, lapolaka.com; Diana Fuentes, Laredo Morning Times; Angela Kocherga, Belo TV; Andrés Oppenheimer, columnist and author; Anders Gyllenhaal, McClatchy Newspapers, and Alfredo Carbajal, Al Día, Texas.
Former IAPA president Alejandro Junco de la Vega, president of Grupo Reforma of Mexico, will be the keynote speaker at a special luncheon, who will be introduced by the chairman of the Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information, Robert Rivard, San Antonio Express-News, Texas. In addition to Marroquín, Junco de la Vega and Rivard, taking part for the IAPA will be Executive Director Julio E. Muñoz; Press Freedom Director Ricardo Trotti, and María Idalia Gómez and Darío Fritz, investigators with the IAPA Rapid Response Unit in Mexico.
The ASNE-IAPA event is being sponsored by the Ford Foundation, Associated Press and El Paso Times newspaper. The two organizations will continue their strategic alliance in 2011 with the holding of a joint half-year meeting in San Diego, California, April 6-9, while during the previous days they will be holding a Hemisphere Conference on Freedom on the campus of the Institute of the Americas.
The forum is part of the IAPA’s anti-impunity agenda and will serve to follow up commitments made by Mexico’s President Felipe Calderón, who several weeks ago participated together with lawmakers from his country in the organization’s General Assembly, held in Mérida in the Mexican state of Yucatán.
The IAPA is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the defense and promotion of freedom of the press and of expression in the Americas. It is made up of more than 1,300 print publications from throughout the Western Hemisphere and is based in Miami, Florida. For more information please go to http://www.sipiapa.org.
