 |
|
|
 News from Around the Americas | June 2007 
Mexican Reporter Seeks US Asylum
 Lourdes Medrano - Arizona Daily Star
| | El Universal, a Mexico City newspaper, recently reported that about 1,000 people were killed in drug-related violence during the first four months of the year — twice as many as in all of 2006. |
The deep voice on the other end of Claudio Tiznado's cell phone gave no hint of what was to come.
The caller told the Hermosillo, Sonora, journalist that he wanted to share important information related to his newspaper stories. Tiznado assumed it had to do with his recent investigative series exposing the nearby town of Cananea as a drug-trafficking haven that flourished with the blessing of corrupt police and politicians.
Later that April Saturday, Tiznado lay semiconscious in a darkened street, his left arm mangled and his face covered in blood.
His brutal beating, coupled with subsequent phone threats and the killing of an Agua Prieta journalist, propelled Tiznado over the border to Tucson in early May. He is seeking asylum, which the United States may grant to people who fear persecution in their country based on race, nationality, religion, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.
"My life was spared once," said Tiznado, who worked for Periódico Géneros, a bimonthly newspaper in Hermosillo. "But next time – who knows?"
As heightened drug violence has gripped Mexico in recent years, the risks for journalists such as Tiznado have escalated throughout Mexico, with Sonora and other border states being particularly vulnerable as drug cartels vie for key smuggling routes into this country.
El Universal, a Mexico City newspaper, recently reported that about 1,000 people were killed in drug-related violence during the first four months of the year — twice as many as in all of 2006.
In Sonora, the same week that two men kidnapped Tiznado, drove him to an empty house at gunpoint and bludgeoned him with a metal bat, representatives in the state Congress in Hermosillo, Sonora's capital, condemned the attack. Records show lawmakers mentioned robbery as an apparent cause for Tiznado's attack, but the journalist said his assailants took nothing. He told police his suspicions that it stemmed from his mid-March special report.
Noting that Mexico's constitution supports freedom of the press, the state representatives called on authorities to aggressively investigate the attacks against Tiznado and other journalists, and to put an end to the insecurity that prevails among reporters. The call for action was repeated Thursday, a day set aside to observe freedom of expression.
State representative Petra Santos Ortiz of the Democratic Revolutionary Party said she has little faith that the crimes against journalists will be solved anytime soon.
"They say they will investigate," she said of the authorities. "But the truth is we don't feel that any follow-up is done."
Mexican journalism perilous
By the time of Tiznado's assault, Mexico had toppled Colombia as the world's second-most dangerous country for journalists, behind Iraq.
"Mexican journalists are working on a knife edge," said José Antonio Calcáneo, president of the Federation of Mexican Journalists' Associations. "We leave for work in the morning not knowing if we'll be coming back home."
The organization, which Calcáneo said represents more than 125 journalist groups nationally, has documented the killing of 67 journalists since 1983.
From April 2005 to date, the group also counts as missing seven journalists, the earliest being Alfredo Jiménez Mota of Hermosillo. He vanished on April 2 while working for El Imparcial newspaper, the state's largest.
Calcáneo acknowledged speculation that some of the targeted journalists may have been in the pocket of drug cartels. But he noted that the vast majority of reporters, like Jiménez Mota, were known for their investigative work on drug cartels and government corruption.
"What we want is for these cases to be investigated."
Ricardo Trotti of the Inter American Press Association, said the violence against Mexican journalists also has generated self-censorship.
"You can see that the right of the people to know is diminishing, and it's a big concern," said the press freedom director. His group has counted 12 killings and four disappearances of Mexican journalists from April 2, 2005, to April 23 of this year.
Peer's slaying scares reporter
Given the fate of some of his fellow journalists, Tiznado said he considers himself lucky. On April 16, when his two-day hospital stay ended, Agua Prieta journalist Saúl Noé Martinez Ortega was abducted at gunpoint outside the border town's police station. His body turned up in neighboring Chihuahua state the following week.
Tiznado, 33, said the killing of Martinez Ortega, who worked for the Interdiario de Agua Prieta, gave him a new perspective about his own situation. He no longer felt safe practicing his profession.
His sources in Cananea kept urging caution. They informed him that his stories linking slain Agua Prieta Police Chief Ramón Tacho Verdugo to widespread drug corruption in Cananea had unleashed rampant talk of payback. Tiznado said he began investigating the Cananea Police Department and its links to some government officials after Tacho Verdugo was gunned down in February as he left police headquarters. Before he went to Agua Prieta, the career lawman had been chief in Cananea.
Cananea under siege in May
Tiznado's special report on Cananea turned out to be prophetic.
"Cananea residents yearn for an end to era of terror," read one of the headlines.
In the early hours of May 16, Cananea came under siege. A convoy of up to 50 armed assailants burst into town, leaving five local cops and two civilians dead in its wake. Later gunbattles with police and military units brought the death count to more than 20.
Sonora Gov. Eduardo Bours quickly suggested the Cananea bloodshed was drug-related and said he previously had called for a federal investigation of the municipal Police Department.
In Hermosillo, Tiznado was keeping a low profile. To him, the governor's remarks held no surprises.
But he recalled being disappointed that other Sonora journalists had failed to follow his Cananea stories. He had hoped larger newspapers with more resources would have dug deeper.
"I felt really alone," said Tiznado, still bearing scars from the assault.
Despite his harrowing experience, the journalist said he has no regrets about his work in Cananea. That's why he agreed to meet in a distant neighborhood with the stranger who called him that April day. He realized he was in trouble when two armed men got out of a pickup truck and, guns drawn, took him to a nearby house and beat him repeatedly.
Tiznado said he started praying when one of the men aimed his gun at him, as if to pull the trigger. Then the journalist said he heard the second man tell his associate that the beating probably was enough for Tiznado "to tone it down."
The pair then forced the journalist back into the truck and dumped him in a street.
Perhaps he is an idealist in a country where divulging truths can prove fatal, Tiznado said. But in his view, to practice self-censorship goes against journalistic principles.
"A journalist's duty is to denounce, to reveal information that no one wants known but which can generate positive change," he said. "And that's in the best interest of society."
Contact reporter Lourdes Medrano at 573-4347 or lmedrano@azstarnet.com. |
| |
|
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us