Miami, Florida (Nov.
2, 2000).-- The Coordinating Committee of Press Freedom Organizations at
its meeting in Barbados on Saturday, November 4, called on the governments
of Cuba, Peru and Venezuela to take action to halt curtailment of newsgathering
activities to provide greater protection to individual journalists in their
countries.
The situation in Cuba, the Committee declared in a resolution adopted by
the meeting, amounted to "a crime against humanity" and anyone
ignoring that fact was an accomplice to it.
In Peru, the Committee concluded, there was a climate of uncertainty amid
recent political developments and it called for repeal of any law or regulation
restricting press freedom and for punishment of those abusing journalists.
Venezuelas President Hugo Chávez was urged to "abandon his
policy of aggression and attacks on freedom of expression and news men and
women" in another resolution of the Committee, which is made up of
nine regional and global organizations advocating a free and unfettered
press in the world. They include the Inter American Press Association, Committee
to Protect Journalists, Commonwealth Press Union, International Association
of Broadcasting, International Association of the Periodical Press,
International Press Institute, North American Broadcasters Association,
World Association of Newspapers and World Press Freedom Committee.
The Committee also adopted a resolution congratulating the new president
of IAPA, Danilo Arbilla.
Following are the full texts of the Coordinating Committees resolutions:
Members of the Coordinating
Committee of Press Freedom Organizations at its meeting on Saturday, November
4, 2000, in Barbados determined the following:
Whereas
in Cuba for 41 years there has continued an unceasing repression and control
of the Cuban independent press and journalists and the arrest and expulsion
of foreign correspondents continues to occur
The Coordinating Committee
of Press Freedom Organizations resolved:
to protest the complete
lack of freedom in Cuba
to condemn the government
of Cuba for the imprisonment, repression and harassment of independent journalists
to call on the government
of Cuba to free journalists Bernabé Arévalo, Joel de Jesús
Díaz and Manuel González
to issue a call to nations
and international or non-governmental organizations that by ignoring the
situation existing in Cuba, which amounts to a crime against humanity, they
make themselves accomplices.
PERU
Members of the Coordinating
Committee of Press Freedom Organizations at its meeting on Saturday, November
4, 2000, in Barbados considered:
Whereas
in Peru following recent political developments there is a climate of uncertainty
and restriction of freedom of the press
Whereas
television channels 2 and 13 continue not to be restored to their legitimate
owners
the Coordinating Committee
of Press Freedom Organizations calls on the government of Peru:
to restore to their
owners of the news media outlets television channels 2 and 13 with no obstacle
or curtailment of any kind
to call for the elimination
of any kind of law or regulation restricting freedom of the press and to
investigate and punish those entities and individuals who have interfered
in news-gathering activity and have harassed, persecuted, attacked and kidnapped
journalists.
VENEZUELA
Members of the Coordinating
Committee of Press Freedom Organizations at its meeting on Saturday, November
4, 2000, in Barbados considered:
Whereas
the new Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela entails a series
of dangers for the free practice of freedom of expression and of opinion
in constitutionally enshrining the "right to opportune, truthful and
unbiased information" which openly contravenes the American Convention
on Human Rights
Whereas
publishers and journalists are being subjected to trial in courts throughout
the country on charges of denigration, defamation and libel, it being argued,
in order to maliciously extend the trials, that these alleged offenses against
a persons good name should not be subject to a state of limitations
Whereas
the president of Venezuela, in public acts and during a daily broadcast
whose funding is unknown and in which he issues threats, seeks to impart
fear in all those who disagree with his governance
The Coordinating Committee
of Press Freedom Organizations
calls on the Venezuelan
authorities to overturn the concept of "opportune, truthful and unbiased
information" to create an eventual "Press Law"
calls on President Hugo
Chávez to abandon his policy of aggression and attacks on freedom
of expression and on news men and women which because they come from the
head of state are a real threat and an unacceptable abuse of power
to issue a call to all
human rights and press freedom organizations and to the representative democracies
throughout the world in light of the latent threat implied by the government,
of Chávez, who in his own joint statements with Fidel Castro has
made it clear he regards the representative democratic system of government
as null and void.
IAPA
PRESIDENCY
Members of the Coordinating
Committee of Press Freedom Organizations, meeting in Barbados on Saturday
4th November, 2000 and in view of the election of Danilo Arbilla as President
of The Inter American Press Association, a man who for four years occupied
with distinction the chair of the IAPA Committee on Freedom of the Press
and Information and who has supported fully the Coordinating Committee,
approved the following resolution:
1- To express to the
Inter American Press Association in general and to Mr. Danilo Arbilla personally
our congratulations on his election to the Presidency of this institution.
2- To consider this appointment of the new President of the IAPA as a just
recognition of his qualities and long service in defense of freedom of the
expression, freedom of the press and the right to information of all citizens.
FUENTE: nota.texto7
