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Harassed
May 3
José Llaja, Canal 5, ATTACKED, THREATENED
Enrique Cuñeo, El Comercio, ATTACKED, HARASSED
Javier Zapata, Caretas, ATTACKED, HARASSED
Llaja, a cameraman with Canal 5 television; Cuñeo, a photographer with the daily El Comercio; and Zapata, a photographer with the weekly magazine Caretas, were beaten by security guards at Lima's City Hall. The journalists were covering a labor dispute between municipal employees and the mayor's office when security personnel tried to prevent them from filming the event by beating them and destroying the cameras of Cuñeo and Zapata. The mayor later issued a public apology to the journalists and announced that there would be an investigation into the matter. In a report issued at the end of May, the commission that investigated the incident concluded that the head of the Lima police, José La Madrid Ponce, was to blame for the aggressive behavior of the officers at the demonstration. The commission also said that the police reacted inappropriately and used excessive force. La Madrid's handling of the affair will now be the subject of a judicial inquiry.
June 14
Teobaldo Meléndez Fachin, Radio Oriente, Panamericana Televisión, ATTACKED, HARASSED
Meléndez, a reporter for Radio Oriente and Panamericana Televisión, was assaulted by soldiers from the Peruvian air force in the city of Yurimaguas in Callao province. Meléndez was covering the arrival of the bishop of Callao, Miguel Irizar Campos, at the Yurimaguas airport. When Meléndez tried to get close to the bishop to interview him, he was beaten by soldiers, who also confiscated his camera. They threatened to detain Meléndez if he resisted. The soldiers later returned the camera. The air force issued a statement about the incident, saying that Meléndez had verbally abused one of the soldiers. Meléndez denied that accusation.
October 19
Gisu Guerra, Peruvian News Channel (CPN), HARASSED
Security police detained Guerra, a reporter for the radio station CPN, for several hours, according to the Institute for Press and Society (IPYS). She had gone to the Casimiro Ulloa Hospital in Lima to interview an alleged member of Peru's National Intelligence Service (SIN), who later died. The police held her at the hospital, although she identified herself as a journalist, and then took her to a local branch of the National Criminal Investigations Unit. She was asked to give police a statement and then released.
October 24
Nicolas Lucar, Channel Four, HARASSED
Alamo Perez Luna, Channel Four, HARASSED
Lucar and Perez Luna, director and reporter for the program “La Revista Dominical” on the Channel Four television network, reported that they have been harassed by unidentified men who staked out Channel Four's offices in vans with tinted windows. The journalists believe the harassment is related to news reports about a prominent airline executive's alleged ties to drug traffickers. Lucar told the Institute for Press and Society (IPYS) that the same vehicles have parked outside of his home and that he has received anonymous calls on his unlisted cellular telephone from an unidentified caller who asks for Lucar by name. Perez Luna said that similar vehicles had followed him from the Orson Welles Journalism Institute, where he teaches.
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