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COLOMBIA-MEDIA-HOMICIDE
Colombian reporter dies of gunshot wounds
BOGOTA, Dec 24, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – A Colombian journalist who had covered
organized crime died Wednesday two days after suffering multiple gunshot
wounds in Cali, in the southwest of the country, his newspaper said.
“Felipe Guevara, our crime reporter, died this Wednesday afternoon after
being injured in an attack on Monday evening,” said the newspaper Q’hubo on
its Twitter account.
Guevara, 27 had reported death threats to the police since 2017, Cali’s
mayor Jorge Ivan Ospina said at a press conference, where he offered a reward
of up to $15,000 for any information on the killers.
Although police had initially denied the attack against Guevara was linked
to his work as a reporter and photographer, Ospina said the authorities were
studying “all possible hypotheses” as to the motives for the killing.
According to the Press Freedom Foundation (FLIP), Guevara had had to leave
the neighborhood where he was fatally injured in 2017, following threats
“after he had written about a criminal gang operating in this area.”
He had reported new threats “in 2018 and August of this year,” FLIP added
in a statement.
“It is worrying that the national police initially rule out the fact that
the attack on Guevara could be linked to his work as a journalist,” said the
foundation.
Juliette de Rivero, representative in Colombia of the UN High Commissioner
for Human Rights, denounced the crime and called “for a rapid and effective
investigation to punish those responsible”.
BSS/AFP/RY/10:34hrs