Journalist killed in Mexico

Founder of local radio station was shot dead in his car on eve of World Press Freedom Day

Mexican radio journalist Telesforo Santiago Enriquez was killed Thursday in Oaxaca state, the latest journalist to be slain in Mexico — which the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) calls the deadliest country for journalists in the western hemisphere.

Jesus Ramirez Cuevas, spokesperson for Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, tweeted Thursday that Enriquez founded a community radio station in Oaxaca, and said the Mexican government was “committed to finding those responsible for this attack against Mexican journalism.” The Associated Press reported that Enriquez was found dead with gunshot wounds in a vehicle.

According to CPJ data, 48 journalists have been killed in Mexico since 1992, including 45 who were targeted for murder. Of those cases, 40 were murdered with impunity, the watchdog group says.

Several Mexican journalists have been killed this year, although CPJ has not confirmed that all of these killings were directly related to the victims’ work.

In March, Mexican media reported that journalist Omar Ivan Camacho was found dead in Sinaloa state. Just a few days earlier, radio journalist Santiago Barroso was shot dead in his home in northern Mexico. According to CPJ, the state’s attorney general said at the time that he appeared to have been targeted because of his work as a journalist.

In February, Samir Flores Soveranes, an activist who also worked in community radio, was fatally shot. And in January, another radio journalist, Rafael Murúa Manríquez, was also found dead.

It is a cruel irony that another journalist was killed in Mexico on the eve of World Press Freedom Day, a day intended to celebrate the difficult circumstances journalists face and to honour those who have been killed or jailed because of their work.