ARGENTINA II
WHEREAS
the publishing company of the newspaper El Tribuno of Salta, Horizontes S.A.,
was notified on February 2, 2004 of a ruling by Judge Guillermo Félix
Díaz that imposes a series of restrictions on its news reporting, in
a court case that has shaken the community of Salta
WHEREAS
this measure was taken at the request of the attorney for Francisco José
Álvarez, who was tried and subsequently acquitted in the 1994 murder
of bus driver José Antonio Morales, in a case that generated a considerable
amount of public interest
WHEREAS
the newspaper El Tribuno, exercising its right to inform the public, reported
on the events and disseminated opinions in order to satisfy the public’s
legitimate right to be informed
WHEREAS
Judge Díaz stated in his ruling that the newspaper should “refrain
from using expressions, sentences, phrases or words that might entail an encroachment
on the presumption of a person’s innocence, and from publishing that
person’s photograph”
WHEREAS
the judge also ruled that failure to comply with this order would incur a
“warning judgment” consisting of a fine of 5,000 pesos for each
case
WHEREAS
this court ruling is a clear attempt to impose prior restraint on a newspaper
and displays the heavy-handed tendencies that lead some judges to assume the
role of censors to protect certain individual rights
WHEREAS
Principle 5 of the Declaration of Chapultepec states, “Prior censorship,
restrictions on the circulation of the media or dissemination of their reports,
forced publication of information, the imposition of obstacles to the free
flow of news, and restrictions on the activities and movements of journalists
directly contradict freedom of the press”
THE MIDYEAR MEETING OF
THE IAPA RESOLVES
to address the justice
system in Salta to express the IAPA’s most emphatic disapproval of this
measure by Judge Guillermo Félix Díaz, as it constitutes a blatant
act of censorship in violation of Article 14 of the Argentine Constitution
and Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights
to express the IAPA’s
hope that respect for freedom of expression and freedom of the press will
prevail in the superior courts of the justice system in Salta and that this
decision will be reversed and vacated.
questions
or comments?