Journalist Critical of President and Attorney General Arrested in Guatemala

The Guatemalan police arrested this Friday the journalist José Rubén Zamora, president of the newspaper El Periódicodenouncer of alleged acts of corruption of the ruler Alejandro Giammattei and the attorney general Consuelo Porras, sanctioned by the United States.

Zamora was arrested at his residence in the south of Guatemala City. accused of money laundering in a confidential investigationJuan Luis Pantaleón, spokesman for the Public Ministry (MP), told AFP.

“He was captured for a case of possible money laundering. It is not for his journalistic workbut as a businessman,” declared Pantaleón.

Police and prosecutors also raided the newspaper’s headquarters in an operation that the newspaper attributed to retaliation for its publications. on corruption in government and Porras, backed by Giammattei.

“The Attorney General [Consuelo Porras] specifies the threats made against the president of El Periódico. They will not shut us up“, indicated the newspaper in its social networks.

Last September, the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) condemned that the Judiciary ordered an investigation into El Periódico for having published the statement of a witness about alleged anomalous acts by Porras.

The Human Rights Ombudsman, Jordán Rodas, arrived at the court building in the center of the capital where Zamora is expected to be transferred.

“We are in a very difficult moment. I would not like to think that we are becoming a Nicaragua 2.0,” Rodas said in reference to the prosecution and conviction of journalists critical of President Daniel Ortega in recent years.

In June, The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) added Guatemala to its list of countries where it observes serious human rights violations, a charge that Giammattei rejects. There are Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.

For her part, Carolina Jiménez Sandoval, president of the NGO Washington Office for Latin America (WOLA), said on Twitter that the arrest “is an unacceptable attack on the practice of journalism.”

“There is no democracy without freedom of expression”he indicated.

The MP, under the leadership of Porras, has been questioned for arresting and prosecuting several anti-mafia judges and prosecutors, although the entity assures that all of them failed to fulfill their duties.

The prosecutor has been sanctioned by Washington and included in a list of “corrupt and undemocratic” actors, or the Engel List.