WHEREAS, in Nicaragua - in August - the regime carried out the theft of the facilities of La Prensa, the oldest newspaper in the country founded 96 years ago - still occupied by police officers - and jailed three of its senior executives, without due process and using fabricated charges
WHEREAS, in Venezuela the judiciary completed the seizure of the newspaper El Nacional - which since February became part of the personal patrimony of Diosdado Cabello - in a questionable judicial process that awarded the headquarters and the land as part of an outlandish compensation
WHEREAS, in Argentina - in November - a group of hooded individuals attacked the facilities of the Clarín newspaper in Buenos Aires with Molotov cocktails, and in December protesters vandalized and set fire to parts of the facilities of the El Chubut newspaper in the city of Trelew
WHEREAS, in Colombia, the facilities of the digital and print media Trochando Sin Fronteras and the community radio station Sarare Stereo were destroyed on January 19 in Saravena, department of Arauca - due to the explosion of a car bomb attributed to FARC splinter groups
WHEREAS, the Chapultepec Declaration condemns in its Principle 4 "terrorism, physical destruction of the media and impunity for perpetrators" and establishes that "these actions must be promptly investigated and severely punished"
THE IAPA MID-YEAR MEETING RESOLVES
To demand that the Nicaraguan regime stop the attack on independent media and journalists and return the newspaper La Prensa to its legitimate owners, as well as the assets of other previously seized media outlets - such as Confidencial and 100% Noticias
To demand that the Venezuelan regime - in collusion with the judicial apparatus - voids the sentence that allowed the seizure of the newspaper El Nacional and return it to its rightful owners
To demand that the courts of Argentina and Colombia investigate, identify and punish those responsible for the violent attacks against the headquarters of the newspapers Clarín and El Chubut, in Argentina, and against the media Trochando Sin Fronteras, and the radio station Sarare Stereo, in Colombia - in order to eliminate all traces of impunity that could encourage other attacks in the future.
