CULIACAN, México — Journalists are under siege in the northern Mexico state of Sinaloa, where notorious drug trafficker Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera was captured in January after a fierce gun battle with soldiers.
Grenades have been hurled at El Debate, Culiacán’s largest-circulation newspaper. Gunmen have opened fire with AK-47s on the reception desk of Mazatlán office of the daily newspaper Noroeste. Journalists have been questioned at gunpoint. Some have disappeared. Others have been found dead.
In Sinaloa, a state described by a former governor as the “birthplace of drug trafficking in México,” InquireFirst Executive Director Lynne Walker led a two-day symposium on investigative journalism and journalist safety.
Walker conducted the Spanish-language symposium Feb. 23-24 at the invitation of the U.S. Consulate in Hermosillo and the U.S. Consulate in Tijuana. It was the first investigative journalism workshop held in Culiacán for reporters and editors working in Sinaloa’s major cities. Read more…