By Monica Saba, IJNet Spanish Editor

In Mexico, freedom of speech is protected by law. Yet each year since 2000, an average of seven journalists have been murdered. Already in 2008, six journalists have been murdered, according to advocacy groups.

Concerns with journalism in Mexico have been on the rise in recent years, as have violence, drug-trafficking, impunity, and lack of political will. 

On April 3, three journalists talked about these and other risks to journalism in a forum in Washington, D.C., called “Reporting in Mexico, a Dangerous Assignment: Murder and Impunity against the Press.”   

At the event, sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the International Journalists’ Network (IJNet) was provided exclusive insight on the current situation in Mexico, including information on adopted measures to protect journalists, limits to coverage, and steps journalists are taking to protect themselves.  

Mexico’s dangerous environment has certainly affected the journalist’s vocation, said Jorge Morales Borbón, editorial deputy director of Frontera and La Crónica. It is ever-more difficult to find people who want to pursue journalism, he said. 

Because it is not easy to investigate illegal activities -- such as drug trafficking -- directly, journalism in Mexico has to change, said Daniel Rosas, news deputy director of El Mañana. "We can publish the effects that [drug trafficking] has on the economy, and then promote peace campaigns,” he suggested. 

Covering how communities are negatively affected by the rise in illegal activities is also important, Rosas added. For instance, we can highlight the resultant economic hardship or how people abandon their region, he said. "The press has to cover these facts in a creative, journalistic and active way," Rosas said. 

According to Borbón, journalists in Mexico have to be a lot more rigorous in corroborating information. "In our newsroom,” he said, “one of the things that we have done is to build alliances with other media —such as Reforma and Proceso— with which we share information on a case that we are investigating and publish it simultaneously," he said. 

He and other journalists see this as a way to fight self-censorship in Mexico. 

Free expression for all

The speakers agree that is important for advocacy organizations to exert pressure on authorities to promote citizenship and push for freedom of expression for all citizens. 

"Journalists have failed to convey to citizens that the murder of journalists is not only a matter of the press,” Borbón said. “We have failed in conveying to the people that if [the authorities] kill a journalist, they kill the hope that Mexicans have of receiving information on what is happening around them," he added. 

Lack of federal support

According to panelists, there is little support for murdered journalists’ investigations among the Mexican government. The problem, they said, is that the government sends in special interest groups that have little knowledge of the region to investigate. 

Rosas thinks that a bilateral approach should be employed. This matter "must be seen as a problem of both countries -- Mexico and United States.” 

A large percentage of murders of journalists in Mexico go unpunished, panelists said. To change this,  drug trafficking operations must be uncovered and authorities must be pressured to investigate and act. 

In response to the panel’s anxieties, Joel Simon, CPJ executive director, said “a [simultaneous] local/state investigation and federal investigation” would be ideal.

He continued: “I think that the realistic step is to increase political pressure. We have to create a judicial mechanism that removes excuses that allow us to go to the same authorities to remind them they have the responsibility … There is a need for political pressure on state authorities and federal authorities.”

Journalism training

Mexican journalists continually complain that they are unprepared to cover issues such as drug trafficking and other illicit activities, unlike Colombian journalists who deal with similar issues.   

"I believe that a workshop on how to investigate this kind of theme could minimize the risks," Morales Borbón told IJNet. 

He recommended technical training. "If a journalist knows that he will have to be in the middle of a gunfight, he would have that to learn, for example, how to identify the sound of a weapon. We have received training, certainly, but they have taught us to cover wars. We need something more specific," Borbón added. 

Rosas posed three possibilities: 1) A warning system to enable information to circulate when a journalist is in danger, with information including who, where, how, etc.; 2) Teach journalists the judicial framework, including where to go, when to act, and which organization or governmental body to call; and 3) There should be an open network of organizations that defend human rights, where journalists can present their problems, demands and concerns for “immediate aid.”  

In Mexico we are in a dangerous environment and nobody has coached us on how to cover it, Borbón said. He compared Mexico to the U.S., “where the military provides training for journalists who are going to cover the war in Iraq because they know they are going to cover a dangerous environment.”

Panelists also said the practice of the self-criticism is urgently needed. Now, there are very few research centers and media that are doing critical work on the media -- what they report, how they consult the sources, etc.

There are many issues that must be put on the table of journalists’ advocacy organizations, the panel concluded. The lack of support by the government is only one part of the problem; self-reflection and training are also necessary. 

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To know more about Woodrow Wilson Center, visit http://www.wilsoncenter.org/. For more about CPJ, visit http://www.cpj.org/.