Newspaper photographer gunned down in Minas Gerais

Reporters Without Borders hopes that the police will quickly shed light on newspaper photographer Walgney Assis Carvalho’s murder in the municipality of Coronel Fabriciano, Vale do Aço, in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais, on 14 April. The fourth journalist to be murdered this year in Brazil, Carvalho was gunned down just one month after Rodrigo Neto de Feria, who worked for the same newspaper, Vale do Aço. The two journalists sometimes worked together and, according to some sources, Carvalho had information about his colleague’s murder. The civilian police sometimes also used Carvalho’s services as a photographer. According to the military police, Carvalho was in fish restaurant, in Vale do Aço, when an unidentified individual approached him, shot him in the back and then left on a motorcycle. Aged 43, Carvalho died on the spot. Brazil continues to be the deadliest country for journalists in the Americas, where a total of 13 have been killed since the start of the year. Reporters Without Borders is of the view that a clear link with the victim’s work as a journalist has so far been established in four of these cases. Read the latest Reporters Without Borders report on Brazil.