Mexico: Young cameraman gunned down in Cancún
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls on the Mexican government to do everything possible to end the continuing slaughter of media personnel after a young cameraman in Cancún, in the southeastern state of Quintana Roo, yesterday became the eighth journalist to be murdered in Mexico since the start of the year.
Aged 28, Javier Rodríguez Valladares was gunned down on a street in the resort city’s Supermanzana 29 district while interviewing a local craftsman, who was also killed.
Rodríguez worked mainly as a cameraman for Canal 10, a local TV channel, but colleagues said he sometimes did his own reporting on local politics and interviewed people, and was well known to the entire journalistic community in the Cancún area. The local police are investigating his murder but have yet to find any leads or establish a motive.
“The Quintana Roo authorities must conduct an exhaustive investigation into this cowardly murder and identify those responsible as quickly as possible,” said Emmanuel Colombié, the head of RSF’s Latin America bureau.
“With at least eight journalists killed in Mexico this year, the new government must realize the urgency of the situation and bring the vicious circle of violence to an end by providing the media with effective and lasting protection.”
Rodríguez was the third journalist to be murdered in Quintana Roo this year, following Rubén Pat, the editor of the digital weekly Playa News, and José Guadalupe Chan Dzib, who was its crime reporter.
Mexico is ranked 147th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2018 World Press Freedom Index.
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