| Some Colombian reporters have
also said they have seen lists, drawn up by military intelligence units,
of alleged guerrilla sympathisers among the press. The army, however, has
never publicly acknowledged the existence of such lists.
REUTERS
Thursday, 28 October 1999
Kidnap highlights dangers to press in Colombia
By Karl Penhaul
BOGOTA -- The kidnapping by Marxist rebels of a freelance photographer
who works regularly for Reuters underscores the dangers of covering Colombia's
long-running war in which press freedom is under fire from all sides.
Far from an isolated case, Tuesday's abduction of Henry Romero, 42,
was just the latest in a long line of attacks on the press by leftist guerrillas,
ultra-right paramilitary groups and even state organisations.
Romero was seized in mountains near the southwest city of Cali by the
National Liberation Army (ELN), the country's second largest rebel force.
It was the same unit that kidnapped more than 160 worshippers from a church
Mass in Cali in late May.
A rebel chieftain said Romero, a Colombian, would be held indefinitely
until he clarified why he revealed the identity of another guerrilla commander
by taking a photo of him in June without his trademark red and black face
mask.
The United States on Thursday condemned the kidnap.
"We condemn this outrageous act in the strongest possible terms and
call upon the ELN to release him immediately," State Department spokesman
James Rubin said in Washington.
Bodyguards and bullet-proof vests
The perceived dangers have become so great that on its Internet web site,
the Bogota-based Committee For The Protection of Journalists advises reporters
to consider employing bodyguards, use bulletproof vests and have a valid
passport by their bed in case they have to flee the country.
The Committee says more than 120 Colombian reporters have been murdered
by violent drug mobs and illegal armed gangs in this Andean nation since
1980, four this year alone. It does not document, however, kidnaps or threats
against journalists.
To date, attacks on foreign journalists or Colombian freelancers working
for international organisations have been limited. But Romero's kidnapping
has raised fears that few are now immune from the surge in the three-decade-old
war, which has claimed more than 35,000 lives in just 10 years.
"This outrage committed by the guerrilla organisation shows its disdain
for basic rights and freedom of the press," the leading El Tiempo newspaper
said Thursday in an editorial about Romero's abduction. "It is inadmissible
that they are trying to impose, via force of arms, a gag on the press."
Reuters has deplored the kidnapping and urged Romero's prompt release.
"Reuters has consistently covered all sides in the conflict impartially
and objectively and strongly believes in the professional integrity of
the photographer Henry Romero," said Reuters Editor-in-Chief Mark Wood
in London on Wednesday.
Global press organisations also called for the photographer's immediate
release.
"(We are) deeply concerned about this kidnapping which further illustrates
how press freedom is falling victim to Colombia's civil war," the New York-based
Committee To Protect Journalists said this week.
The International Press Institute wrote to Colombian President Andres
Pastrana on Thursday to express its concern.
"We strongly condemn Romero's kidnapping, which is a flagrant violation
of press freedom and can only serve to further restrict free and impartial
reporting in this bloody civil war," said IPI Director Johann Fritz in
the letter, which was made public in Vienna.
Neither the ELN nor the larger Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
(FARC), which together have a total of some 20,000 combatants and control
up to half the country, have made any secret of their distrust of the press.
Rebel scorn
"The press in Colombia is not free because it is in the pay of private
interests ... The media are in the hands of private political and economic
monopolies," rebel commander Ivan Rios, one of a team of FARC negotiators
in slow-moving peace talks, was reported as saying in Thursday's El Tiempo.
Two of the country's largest media conglomerates, RCN and Caracol, for
example, are owned by the country's two most powerful industrialists.
President Andres Pastrana, whose family also has longstanding media
interests, has reiterated his commitment to upholding press freedoms. But
there has been little let up in perceived harassment of the press by state
institutions in the year since he took office.
Local and international reporters who interview members of illegal armed
gangs on either the left or right are routinely called to give evidence
by the Public Prosecutor's office.
Romero was himself called in to give a statement in August after taking
exclusive photographs of the 160 church worshippers kidnapped by the ELN
in May.
The armed forces also routinely pressure news organisations to surrender
dispatches and unedited images of interviews with armed groups. Technically,
however, Colombia's Constitution protects journalists from being forced
to reveal the sources of their stories.
Some Colombian reporters have also said they have seen lists, drawn
up by military intelligence units, of alleged guerrilla sympathisers among
the press. The army, however, has never publicly acknowledged the existence
of such lists.
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