PARAGUAY

Press freedom was harmed by continuous verbal attacks by the highest authorities and especially by violence committed by organized crime against journalists and the media. The killing of one journalist and the reappearance of one who had been missing for more than a year and had been given up for dead shocked the public. On July 14, radio reporter Enrique Galeano reappeared in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He had disappeared on February 4, 2006. His disappearance had been blamed on drug traffickers connected to the political establishment. Police and independent investigators searched exhaustively for him, and the government was accused of involvement in international human rights courts. The reappearance of Galeano does not discredit in the least the complaints about danger to the free practice of journalism in the area of Yby Yaú and the border with Brazil, where cases of threats, attacks and killings of journalists by drug traffickers protected by corrupt political, police and judicial groups have not been solved. The government reacted to Galeano’s return by accusing the journalist, the reporters’ associations and the media of staging a show to damage the country’s image and bring down the Colorado Party. President Duarte Frutos spoke on July16 of infamous machinery against the Colorados” and threatened criminal actions against those who had tarnished the state with their complaints to international authorities. The governmental reaction of the Galeano case is illustrative of a phenomenon that has been growing for months, that is, the virulent attacks on the press by the Colorado Party. In particular, the President accused the press of “contemptible Manichaeism” in a speech to the General Assembly of the United Nations on September 25. He also said the press was not a “vehicle for truthful news and serious opinion.” On August 7, during the election campaign, Duarte Frutos said the owners of media companies were “smugglers and tax evaders.” “These are the ones who want to teach us about ethics and morality. They think that with ink, flashbulbs and cameras they can defeat the Colorados.” Four days later, the President returned to the fray, criticizing “merchant capital that controls the media” and journalists who publish half truths to harm the Colorado Party. On August 15, during a visit by IAPA members, he said he would continue to attack the press which he called “biased, sectarian and manipulating.” The President called on his supporters “not to be daunted by the anti-Colorado press.” The Chilean-born radio commentator Alberto “Tito” Palma was killed in Mayor Otaño, 300 kilometers from Asunción. Again suspicions fall on drug traffickers of the Itapúa area with the complicity of the police. This event did not diminish the government offensive. On August 26, President Duarte Frutos denounced a “media conspiracy by newspapers, television channels and radio stations,” and on September 6 he accused owners of media companies of wanting him to die. On September 12, Hugo Ramírez, the leader of the Colorado youth group, called for a boycott of the media, while Senator Juan Carlos Galaverna harshly attacked Aldo Zucolillo, editor of the daily ABC Color, during the government party’s anniversary. Two days later, legislator Benjamín Maciel Pasotti criticized by name the editors or owners of the three national dailies, calling them smugglers and forgers. On September 26, Fernando Lugo, the opposition presidential candidate, said the press was biased because it only defended the private interests of its owners. A positive development was the visit of an IAPA delegation on August 14, which appeared in Congress to promote a debate about the need for a freedom of information law. On May 15, Julio Colmán, a Colorado Party legislator, hit the correspondent of ABC Color in Santaní. He was enraged because the paper covered the moment when his son, who had been detained after a traffic accident, entered a court. Oscar Bogado, correspondent of the daily Última Hora in Capitán Miranda (330 kilometers from Asunción), reported being systematically terrorized by telephone calls from area drug traffickers. On August 13, the correspondent of the dailies La Nación and Crónica in Capiibary (320 kilometers from Asunción) received death threats because of the broadcast of homemade videos that involved relatives of a councilman. Luis Ayala, a cameraman from Canal 13 of Ciudad Del Este said he was brutally beaten by three policemen at a local police station. On September 28, Judge Nilse Ortiz dismissed the lawsuit brought by César Rojas Mignarro against La Nación. On October 5, Liberal Party legislator Blas Riveros sued Telmo Ibáñez, the correspondent of ABC Color in Concepción, for defamation. The journalist said stolen cattle had been found on the legislator’s property.