The Legislative Assembly of El Salvador approved on the night of April 4 a reform to the Penal Code that prescribes sentences of 10 to 15 years in prison for media and journalists who “through the use of Communication Technologies, radio, television, written or digital media reproduce messages originating or allegedly originating from gangs.”
Abigail Hernández, director of the organization Nicaraguan Independent Journalists and Communicators (PCIN), points out that the decision of the Government of El Salvador is alarming and they are concerned about the issue of security for communicators in that country and called on the international community to to focus its attention on what is happening in the Central American nation.
“This represents a danger. These are practices that are becoming repetitive. Our greatest fear is that they become common in different countries of the region and that journalism becomes a target of persecution with the aim of silencing voices and that the powers of the State want to prevent an audit and denunciation of cases of corruption and violation of rights. humans,” he said.
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“We extend our solidarity with the journalistic union of El Salvador and we tell them that we are here for whatever they need. We also join those attempts to denounce that they have been making since yesterday. We call on Central American citizens to pay attention to what freedom of the press and expression represents when the media disappears”, he added.
The journalist Sergio Marín Cornavaca, director of “La Mesa Redonda”, rejected and condemned the claims of the Government of El Salvador, in the person of President Nayib Bukele, to criminalize journalistic work.
“It should be noted that authoritarian regimes euphemistically disguise the iron will to silence the media by calling it whatever, we have experienced that in Nicaragua and now we are seeing how in El Salvador the same measures are being replicated by the Ortega dictatorship- Murillo has been carrying out with journalists, “he warned.
“We must alert the authorities of countries in the region and human rights organizations to raise their voices about what is happening in El Salvador. It is definitely an escalation in the attempt to restrict the freedom of expression of Salvadorans and to prosecute and criminalize the exercise of journalistic work. This must be rejected and denounced worldwide », he exhorted.
The Association of Journalists of El Salvador (APES) considers that this reform threatens with jail the media and journalists who report on a reality “that the current administration, obsessed with propaganda and misrepresentation, seeks to hide.”
«From APES we consider these reforms as a clear attempt to censor the media. Prohibiting journalism from reporting the reality of thousands of people who live in communities controlled by gangs will not have any effect on people’s lives, but rather will create a mirage that is not true to the truth. Not mentioning the gangs will not make them disappear either,” César Castro, president of APES, told a conference.
