Journalism on target in Mexico

The journalist Azucena Uresti, threatened by the Jalisco Cartel.

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• Threats against the press in Mexico urge the government to take immediate action

The explicit threats that members of the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel have launched against the Mexican journalist Azucena Uresti and a series of media deserve unanimous condemnation not only from the profession, but from the entire Mexican society. The video in which a narco threatens Uresti shows the extent to which informants are in danger in Mexico, the deadliest country in the world to practice journalism, where so far this year seven reporters have already died. The threats also focus on the authorities, who have been criticized for years for their inaction in the face of threats and without being able to stop the decomposition of the country at the hands of organized crime.

The video, broadcast on social networks, shows a group of hit men speaking on behalf of El Mencho, the boss of the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel, the criminal organization that is advancing without control throughout the Mexican territory. An exaltation of the violence of those who feel sheltered by a system where impunity prevails and in which the only language they pretend to use is that of weapons and terror. The images contain everything that a rule of law and the democratic world must condemn and about which a society must be alert. The attack against Uresti and against large Mexican media cannot be interpreted as another one, since it represents a turning point in a context in which attacks and threats against journalists, wherever they work, are already part of the country's current affairs. .

It is now, more than ever, when the Government must guarantee the safety of those who are dedicated to giving an account of what happens and the full right to information. The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has assured that the State will protect Uresti against intolerable threats. The problem, however, is much deeper. It has been shown that the mechanisms for protecting journalists are very weak, largely flawed, and that criminals have managed to penetrate all layers of the institutions. Mexico demands an immediate paradigm shift. Beyond that urgent urgency, of little help that the president himself, from his morning press conferences,criticize the press again and again with disqualifications that are far from contributing to a plural debate and yes to fueling the rejection of informants. Any change to which a government aspires must go through guaranteeing a free press. There is no time to lose. Mexico deserves a country in peace and with journalism without criminal threats.