Posted by DD republished in part from Mexico News Daily and Insight Crime
Reported by Mexico News Daily,
A well known Chihuahua journalist was killed Thursday morning in the state capital, the third to be assassinated in Mexico this month.
Miroslava Breach Velducea, 54, was killed by four gunshots fired at close range while in a vehicle in the Infonavit Nacional neighborhood at 7:00am, said state police in a statement.
She was outside her home when the attack took place, and was about to drive her son to school.
The victim was a correspondent for La Jornada and El Norte de Juárez and had recently launched a news agency.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 74 percent of journalists killed in Mexico since 1992 covered crime, 29 percent covered corruption and 24 percent covered politics.
Insight Crime reported "Along those lines, Marcela Turati Muñoz, an award-winning reporter for the Mexican news outlet Proceso, told InSight Crime that it was impossible to confirm that organized crime was directly responsible for these killings. But Turati also pointed out that it is just as plausible that the assassinations have to do with political power struggles involving corrupt local politicians and businessmen as it is that they have do with drug trafficking cartels.
"It is easy for many assassins in these areas [where the journalists were killed] to disguise their crimes as the work of organized crime, because they know that no one will thoroughly investigate if the crime presents organized crime characteristics," Turati wrote in an email.
"In Chihuahua, for example, there aren't only cartel disputes, there is also an ongoing political dispute, a political readjustment. And in each of these three states [Guerrero, Veracruz, Chihuahua], links between politicians and cartels come to light," she added.
In March 2016, Breach had written specifically about these links in the state of Chihuahua, revealing the family ties between local candidates for elections and criminal groups."
During her career, the journalist had spoken out against human rights violations and the negative impacts of drug trafficking. Among the most recent subjects she investigated was the displacement of hundreds of familes by drug trafficking organizations in Chihuahua, and organized crime's infiltration of local elections.
A well known Chihuahua journalist was killed Thursday morning in the state capital, the third to be assassinated in Mexico this month.
Miroslava Breach Velducea, 54, was killed by four gunshots fired at close range while in a vehicle in the Infonavit Nacional neighborhood at 7:00am, said state police in a statement.
She was outside her home when the attack took place, and was about to drive her son to school.
The victim was a correspondent for La Jornada and El Norte de Juárez and had recently launched a news agency.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 74 percent of journalists killed in Mexico since 1992 covered crime, 29 percent covered corruption and 24 percent covered politics.
Insight Crime reported "Along those lines, Marcela Turati Muñoz, an award-winning reporter for the Mexican news outlet Proceso, told InSight Crime that it was impossible to confirm that organized crime was directly responsible for these killings. But Turati also pointed out that it is just as plausible that the assassinations have to do with political power struggles involving corrupt local politicians and businessmen as it is that they have do with drug trafficking cartels.
"It is easy for many assassins in these areas [where the journalists were killed] to disguise their crimes as the work of organized crime, because they know that no one will thoroughly investigate if the crime presents organized crime characteristics," Turati wrote in an email.
"In Chihuahua, for example, there aren't only cartel disputes, there is also an ongoing political dispute, a political readjustment. And in each of these three states [Guerrero, Veracruz, Chihuahua], links between politicians and cartels come to light," she added.
In March 2016, Breach had written specifically about these links in the state of Chihuahua, revealing the family ties between local candidates for elections and criminal groups."
During her career, the journalist had spoken out against human rights violations and the negative impacts of drug trafficking. Among the most recent subjects she investigated was the displacement of hundreds of familes by drug trafficking organizations in Chihuahua, and organized crime's infiltration of local elections.
