Another journalist is shot to death in Mexico, the fourth in January

Journalist Roberto Toledo, aged 55, was shot to death this Monday in the municipality of Zitácuaro, in the Mexican state of Michoacán, according to the media outlet Monitor Michoacán, where he worked.

“Today one of our members of our team was murdered. A few minutes ago there was an attempt on his life,” Armando Linares, director of Monitor Michoacán, indicated in a message posted on networks.

Linares explained that this local news outlet had suffered “a series of threats ” in recent months.

“Today these threats were finally carried out,” said the communicator, who explained that it was three armed people who murdered him in a “ruinous” manner.

Linares, visibly affected, attributed the murder of his partner to the work of the media, dedicated to “exhibiting corruption” of the authorities and politicians.

“We are not armed, we do not bring weapons. Our only defense is a pen, a pencil, a notebook”, he pointed out.

The NGO Article 19, dedicated to the defense of freedom of expression, confirmed the crime to Efe.

Violence against journalists in Mexico

Without counting this last death yet, Article 19 sum 148 journalists killed for their work since 2000 to date in Mexico, 31 of them during the mandate of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which began in December 2018.

After a crime in December of 2018 and ten in 2019, the country registered 7 homicides of communicators in 2020 and another 7 in 2021.

But the slight downward trend of recent years has been truncated this January with the death of four reporters: José Luis Gamboa in the port of Veracruz (Veracruz); Margarito Martínez and Lourdes Maldonado in Tijuana (Baja California) and Roberto Toledo (Michoacán).