Salvadoran journalists consider that more than a year of state of exception in El Salvador It has taken its toll on the fundamental freedoms of Salvadorans, among which they point out a “serious” deterioration in freedom of expression and the free exercise of journalism.
“Last year we ended up with 136 attacks against journalists,” said Angélica Cárcamo, president of the Association of Journalists of El Salvador in a forum held this Friday together with social and academic organizations to address ‘The delicate state of freedom of expression and of the press in El Salvador’.
The leader of the Salvadoran journalists’ affiliate added that the registered attacks have come from the different instances of the state, “but also from the Legislative Assembly that has created the legal reforms” to restrict the work of journalists, while Salvadorans they are facing a judicial system “complacent” with the government in power.
The APES report indicates that 49% of the attacks come from second-grade or popularly elected officials. These include elements of the National Civil Police (PNC) and the Armed Forces.
The journalist Víctor Peña, a member of the editorial board of El Faro, who in recent weeks announced the transfer of its offices to Costa Rica Faced with the “harassment” suffered by the government, he said that the most serious thing “is the restriction of the powers of the State” by the government in turn.
At the same time, he said that they have made progress in actions and a strategy to “annihilate the independent media and impose their message”, which in his opinion has resulted in there not being a “democratic or political balance” of the information spectrum in the Central American country.
Peña also raises a self-criticism of the journalists’ union and points out that communicators who, in previous governments, it was publicly known that they received bribes from the ruling party, today are figures aligned with the current Executive and are part of the gear that manages the hegemonic narratives, which has led to the discredit of the profession and even the media.
“The same [periodistas] Those who made journalism lose credibility are the same ones who today work from the propaganda apparatus to destroy journalism,” he said.
El Salvador in the international spotlight
The president of the Inter-American Press Association (SIP), Michael Greenspon, warned in recent days during the semi-annual meeting of the regional body that harassment against journalists is not only part of countries with established dictatorships. “There are also high levels of contempt in countries where there are free elections (…) Many have left El Salvador due to government persecution,” Greenspon said.
The forced departure of journalists from El Salvador under pressure for their work has not only alerted the IAPA; The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), from Washington, has asked the Salvadoran government return constitutional guarantees to citizenship, which include the inherent right to free expression and the press.
The reality told by only one side
The discredit of the media and journalists from the channels of the ruling party has also led to a citizenry that only receives a version of reality painted “as very cool“But the truth is,” said Peña, “that when you reach communities like the ones that gangs harassed for years, “the conditions of poverty and exclusion have not changed,” and there, he said, there is work for the independent press.
The road is arduous – he pointed out – because in his opinion “this government has been capable of making enemies of the press and has managed to take messages to the population to reject journalists.”
Julián Cárdenas, a professor at the University of Valencia, Spain, who was invited to the discussion this Friday, added that his studies carried out in Latin America compiling information from different data banks have led him to argue that the greater the freedom of expression in the countries, the less degree of corruption, and vice versa.
“The more freedom of the press there is, the less corruption there is, and where there is less considering the level of commerce in a country and taking all factors into account, there is still a significant relationship,” Cárdenas opined.
This Tuesday, in the run-up to World Press Freedom Day, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele said that in Latin America there are media outlets and “journalists paid” by the American philanthropist and financier Goerge Soros.
“But in reality they are not journalists, they are political activists with a defined and perverse world agenda,” accused the president without offering evidence to support his allegations.
In the framework of World Press Freedom Day, on May 3, the Secretary of State of the United States, Antony Blinkensaid that governments of all walks of life use a variety of strategies to silence independent journalism.
“Imprisonment is not the only threat journalism faces. Journalists working on coverage of violent conflict and corruption are subjected to acts of intimidation and kidnapping, often carried out with impunity. Elsewhere, journalists they face discrimination, censorship and the use of justice systems as weapons,” he said.
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