Toby Stirling Hill - 'We’re going to kill you': Nicaragua's brutal crackdown on press freedom

By Dilip -
Nicaraguan TV journalist Miguel Mora was driving home from work when he was pulled over by armed police. “They ordered me take off my glasses and put a hood over my head,” says Mora, who directs the 100% Noticias news channel. “Then they took me by the neck and forced me into a pickup, where an officer told me: ‘You’re responsible for the death of police. If you keep fucking around, we’re going to kill you and your whole family.’” It was the sixth time Mora had been detained by police in the space of a week. He also faces criminal charges of “inciting hate”, while drones have filmed his house and armed men on motorbikes track his movements.

Such intimidation is part of an escalating assault on press freedoms in Nicaragua, unleashed in the wake of the civil revolt that paralysed the country earlier in the year. Journalists have been beaten, 
arrested, and robbed; radio stations raided by police. This week, both the UN and the IACHR 
condemned the intensifying harassment. “This government has banned protest, captured opposition leaders, and now the only thing preventing a totalitarian dictatorship is the independent media,” says Mora. “This is the stage where they try to silence us.”  The family of journalist Angel Gahona, who was killed working in an area of Nicaragua roiled by violent anti-government protests. Photograph: Oswaldo Rivas/Reuters

Anti-government protests broke out in April, sparked by the mismanagement of fires in a protected reserve and fuelled by fiscal reforms that slashed social security. They spread after police used live ammunition on demonstrators, killing dozens. As the crisis worsened, 100% Noticias beamed police and paramilitary violence into homes across the country. Newspapers exposed the state’s lethal tactics: one investigation drew on radiographic evidence to show that many of the deaths were the result of a single gunshot to the head, neck or chest – proof that state forces were shooting to kill.

From the start of the unrest, the government tried to control coverage, pressuring media bosses to self-censor. Journalists at Channel 10 – owned by Mexican tycoon Remigio Ángel González – were initially barred from reporting on demonstrations… read more
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/dec/10/nicaragua-journalists-press-freedom-crackdown-ortega

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