The Mexican journalists' tragedy

The drug-related violence that has been engulfing Mexico affects in particular journalists.Since 2000, 55 journalists have been murdered, 18 of them since the start of 2010.
In the last days the brutality of the attacks against the press has reached awesome proportions and it increasingly takes place far from the Northern "narco states" of Chihuaha, Tamaulipas or Nuevo Leon. The Atlantic port city of Veracruz is in the eye of the storm with an increased number of killings linked to the frontal turf battles between the Zetas and Sinaloa cartels.
On May 4 the dismembered bodies of two news photographers specializing in crime coverage were found in a canal, in Veracruz state, together with those of a former photojournalist and another man.
In London the Catholic NGO CAFOD opened on May 3 an photo exhibition called The Silenced: Fighting for Press Freedom in Mexico to highlight a drama that is unfolding without my attention in the European media's radar screen.
This killing spree targeting journalists is one barometer of the larger crime epidemic hitting the country. Since President Calderon launched a full fledged army offensive against the cartels in 2006, more than 50,000 Mexicans - gang members, security forces, police, journalists and innocent bystanders - have been killed in drug-related violence.

Hong Kong Human rights award for Radio Free Asia

Radio Free Asia, a radio sponsored by the US government (like Radio Free Europe), won two awards at the 16^th annual Hong Kong Human Rights Press Awards sponsored by the Foreign Correspondents Club, Amnesty International, and the Hong Kong Journalists Association.It was particularly rewarded for its online investigation into human trafficking.
RFA’s series documents the advent of child soldier recruitment in Burma, labor abuses in China’s black factories, traffickers targeting refugee camps in Thailand, and North Korean mothers being forcibly wed in China, among other instances of trafficking.
To see the documentary, click here : http://www.rfa.org/english/news/special/HumanTrafficking/Home.html

An "electronic journalist's" duty: protect your notes and sources

Many journalists know how to use new telecommunications technologies for reporting but very few take the basic precautions to, make sure their communications and data are protected against surveillance, intrusion, theft or repression.
Tbis CPJ blog provides a few interesting tips and links to other resources, particularly on how to use mobile phones safely.

http://www.cpj.org/security/2012/05/in-digital-security-knowledge-and-simplicity-are-k.php

The Ten Most Censored Countries

On the eve of World Press Freedom Day the Committee to Protect Journalists has released its list of "10 most censored countries", a journey through a world of legal suffocation, crude intimidation and "his Master's Voice" media.
On top of the scissor holders Eritrea, a country that is nearly completely erased from the world's radar screen, followed by North Korea which invites itself regularly on the world news agenda through its nuclear proliferation blackmail, Syria where independent journalists are not welcome, Iran, Equatorial Guinea, Uzbekistan Burma, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Belarus and close on their heels, China, Azerbaijan, Sudan etc.
Let us underline that as Columbia University President Lee Bollinger writes in his essay "Uninhibited, Robust, And Wide-Open. A Free Press for A New Century" (Oxford University Press, 2010), "whenever there is censorship anywhere, there is censorship everywhere". 

http://www.cpj.org/reports/2012/05/10-most-censored-countries.php