MEXICO CITY: Mexicos government National Human Rights Commission has taken the odd position that a protection mechanism for journalists should protect the head of the governments own news agency.
The Interior Department, which oversees the publicly-funded protection program, turned down the commissions request Wednesday, saying the government has plenty of other ways to protect its own officials.
The rights commission usually protects private individuals against abuses by public servants, not vice-versa. The protection program protects private and independent journalists against attacks, usually by gangs or corrupt local officials, and often assigns them bodyguards.
But this time the commission threw its weight behind Sanjuana Martnez, the head of the government-financed news agency Notimex.
Notimex has been shuttered by a strike since 2020, shortly after Sanjuana Martnez was appointed to run it. Martnez has proved controversial because she largely replaced the journalists who had previously been employed by Notimex, leading to the strike.
Some critics claim Martnez, appointed by President Andrs Manuel Lpez Obrador, has turned the agency into a mouthpiece for his administration’s policies, and accuse her of using social media to slam private journalists who sometimes criticize Lpez Obrador.
But Martnez claims she has been hounded by other journalists and a press freedom group, and prevented from doing her job by the strike.
The Interior Department had turned down Martnez’s request for protection earlier this year, and the rights commission demanded it reconsider.
The protection mechanism was already strained and under-funded before the request in a country considered the most dangerous place for journalists outside a war zone. Press groups say nine journalists were killed in Mexico in 2020, the highest total of any country not at war, and another was killed last week in the northern border state of Sonora.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
Read all the Latest News, Breaking News and Coronavirus News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Telegram.
Comments
0 comment