CPJ condemns harassment of journalists in Brazil

São Paulo, April 22, 2015--The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the harassment of journalists reporting on corruption in the Brazilian state of Paraná and calls on authorities to ensure their safety. A Brazilian journalist has gone into hiding after receiving death threats, while at least four others from a daily news outlet said they have been constantly harassed by police, according to the reporters and their employers.


"It is disturbing that Brazilian journalists reporting on essential issues like police corruption continue to face death threats, harassment, and attempts to force them to reveal their sources," said Carlos Lauría, CPJ's senior program coordinator for the Americas, from New York. "Independent authorities must carry out an exhaustive investigation of these acts of intimidation--including any by local law enforcement--and ensure journalists are able to do their jobs."

James Alberti, a producer for TV station RPCTV in the southern state of Paraná, fled the state after an unidentified man called the station on April 9 and said there were plans to assassinate the journalist and make it look like a robbery, according to news reports and local journalists' and press freedom organizations. The Rede Paranaense de Comunicação (GRPCOM) media group, which owns RPCTV, said it took a series of measures to protect their journalists' safety.

The threat came after RPCTV aired reports on alleged corruption and pedophilia inside the state government's tax office in Londrina, a city approximately 240 miles from the state capital, Curitiba, GRPCOM said in a public statement. Alberti was the producer of the reports. The station aired dozens of reports on the topics, beginning in February and the most recent of which was this week, a GRPCOM official told CPJ. GRPCOM vowed not to stop its reporting, the statement added.


http://cpj.org/2015/04/cpj-condemns-harassment-of-journalists-in-brazil.php

A shame there aren't any other famously intrepid, adversarial journalists in Brazil willing to speak out against this brazen government crackdown against press freedoms... Greenwald is a real fuckin' hero, all right...