ECUADOR

WHEREAS the government is using the Communication Act and its Supercom agency as a way to install a system of government censorship that has led to the assessment of 37 penalties against journalists, cartoonists, and media outlets WHEREAS the government continues to harass independent media outlets and to use state-owned media outlets as propaganda agencies WHEREAS the government seeks to silence humor by assessing penalties in cases such as that of Xavier Bonilla, popularly known as “Bonil,” a cartoonist for the newspaper El Universo THE MIDYEAR MEETING OF THE IAPA RESOLVES To emphasize that the Communication Act is not a way to democratize the media, and that its enforcement will curtail freedom of expression and press freedom To warn that the increasing concentration of media outlets in government hands undermines democracy in Ecuador To reject the Ecuadorian government’s attempt to define communication as a public service mandated by the Constitution To reject the Ecuadorian government’s steadily increasing control over social media and the Internet   To reject the persecution carried out by the Superintendency of Communication against humorists and cartoonists in Ecuador.