Mexico: Report- Female Crime Reporter Norma Sarabia Gunned Down.

Location: Mexico, Tabasco
Date: June 12, 2019

Journalist Norma Sarabia was shot dead by two men in Tabasco, Mexico on Tuesday, June 11, 2019.

Following her murder, Norma becomes the sixth journalist to be killed in the country this year. The Coalition For Women In Journalism urges the government to take immediate action against these killings.

Mexican crime journalist Norma Sarabia was gunned down outside her residence by armed gunmen in Mexico’s Huimanguillo on Tuesday night. She was a staffer at local news outlet Tabasco Hoy, where she had worked for the past 15 years.

Hector Tapia, the paper’s editorial director, shared his grief on Twitter stating: “We deeply regret her death and we sympathize with her family.”Several other people have been killed in Huimanguillo city in connection with fuel smuggling in the past few months.

Mexico, a deadly place to be a journalist

Sarabia is now the sixth journalist to be killed in the country this year alone. In 2018, 10 journalists were gunned down.Reporters Without Borders ranks Mexico as the third most dangerous country in the world for reporters, after Afghanistan and Syria.Sarabia’s publication Tabasco Hoy announced a reward for information leading to Sarabia’s killers and asked, “Six journalists assassinated; most killers unpunished. Security?”

The Coalition For Women In Journalism urges the Mexican government to launch a nationwide investigation on the cold-blooded murders of journalists, activists and citizens.

“The CFWIJ has seen women journalists to be targeted ruthlessly in the country since we started our work. In fact, the gory methods of how women journalists have been targeted here for years, is not something we at the CFWIJ have seen anywhere else in the world,” said CFWIJ’s Founding Director Kiran Nazish.

Mexican journalist and CFWIJ member Ixchel Cisneros added, “It is outrageous that in Mexico journalists are still getting killed for their work, that cases continue to accumulate and victims do not find justice,” she said and added, “Norma was a journalist who had denounced harassment by authorities in the state of Tabasco; last night, she was murdered when she got home. She was a single mother and now it is her son who will suffer for life for this crime.”

Ixchel says, journalists in Mexico including herself “demand justice for Norma and for more than 100 journalists murdered in the country.”

Kiran Nazish also reiterated, “We request the state to cooperate with efforts to bring safety to free speech in the country. To especially look into the sensitive matter of targeting of women reporters, who are being targeted quite dynamically in this country. It won’t happen without the government and other concerned authorities taking well-measured and firm steps to protect women journalists, and free speech, in general. Unless this is done, the Mexican people will not feel safe.”

More than 100 people have been killed in Mexico since 2000. These murders are mostly linked to drug-related trafficking and political corruption. The vast majority of the killings remain unpunished.

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The Coalition For Women In Journalism is a global organization of support for women journalists. The CFWIJ pioneered mentorship for mid-career women journalists across several countries around the world, and is the first organization to focus on the status of free press for women journalists. We thoroughly document cases of any form of abuse against women in any part of the globe. Our system of individuals and organizations brings together the experience and mentorship necessary to help female career journalists navigate the industry. Our goal is to help develop a strong mechanism where women journalists can work safely and thrive.

Follow us on Instagram @womeninjournalism and Twitter @CFWIJ.

Our website is WomenInJournalism.org and we can be reached at press@womeninjournalism.org

The CFWIJ strongly condemns the police brutality against journalists. We demand the immediate return of the press cards seized from the security forces. Policies to intimidate journalists should be abandoned, and journalism should be practiced under the criteria of freedom of the press.

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