The physique of 59-year-old Mexican journalist Luis Martín Sánchez Iñiguez, who has been lacking since Wednesday, was discovered within the Mexican state of Nayarit on Saturday. On the time of his disappearance, Sánchez Iñiguez was working as a correspondent for the Mexico Metropolis newspaper La Jornada.
Talking on the invention, prosecutors defined, “The physique was discovered with indicators of violence, and two handwritten indicators have been discovered on it.”
This marks the second dying of a reporter in Mexico up to now this 12 months and follows within the wake of 15 murders involving media members in 2022.
Solely two days after Sánchez Iñiguez disappeared, journalist Jonathan Lora Ramírez was kidnapped by armed males. He was later discovered safely on Saturday. That is in distinction to journalist Osiris Maldonado, who has been lacking since July 3. In February, information photographer José Ramiro Araujo, 67, was stabbed and crushed to dying in northern Mexico.
This string of violence helps proof released earlier this 12 months by The Committee to Protect Journalists, which reported that killings of journalists worldwide “rose sharply” in 2022, with 68 journalists being killed. Latin America emerged because the deadliest area for reporters final 12 months. Mexico additionally ranks 128th on the Reporters Without Borders World Press Freedom Index, which goals to check the extent of press freedom loved by journalists and media throughout 180 nations and territories. In explaining Mexico’s low place, the Index explains:
12 months after 12 months, Mexico stays one of many world’s most harmful and lethal nations for journalists. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in energy since 2018, has not but carried out the reforms and measures wanted to cease the spiral of violence towards the press.
Prosecutors highlighted the hyperlink between these violent acts and the media, explaining that their investigation is specializing in the journalistic work of the victims, notably as a result of it’s “identified that sooner or later they collaborated in joint tasks associated to their occupation.” The prosecutors’ statement concluded by highlighting that, if needed, these investigations could also be forwarded to the Particular Prosecutor’s Workplace for Consideration to Crimes dedicated towards Freedom of Expression.