Pubdate: Thurs, 13 Jan 2000 Source: Chicago Tribune (IL) Copyright: 2000 Chicago Tribune Company Contact: 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611-4066 Website: http://www.chicagotribune.com/ Forum: http://www.chicagotribune.com/interact/boards/ Author: Ken Guggenheim COLOMBIA'S VIOLENCE DRIVING ITS JOURNALISTS FROM COUNTRY REPORTERS TEETERING ON TIGHTROPE IN 35-YEAR WAR BOGOTA, Colombia -- Newspaper reporter Carlos Pulgarin never wanted to leave his country. Not for work. Not for vacation. Never. But on Dec. 8, after months of death threats because of his coverage of Colombia's civil war, he took his wife, 3-year-old son, some hastily packed bags and a heavy heart onto an international flight. He doesn't know when he'll be back. "It's the first time that I left the country. I told my wife that I'm leaving crying," he said. Drug and political violence have long made Colombia one of the most dangerous places to be a journalist. The situation appears to be getting worse. Rebel guerrillas, paramilitaries and soldiers are using threats, kidnappings, beatings and killings to bully reporters into presenting their views. For much of the 35-year civil war, combatants had largely respected journalists' neutrality. But with fighting and a peace process advancing simultaneously, media control is considered an important weapon. "The situation seems to have changed in the last few months because the conflict is more violent and more bloody," said Cesar Mauricio Velasquez, dean of the journalism school at Sabana University. "The factions have more land, more arms. They have a greater power of intimidation. They have a greater strategy of communication." Ignacio Gomez, a reporter who heads Colombia's Press Freedom Foundation, said that as factions take over territory they believe they should be able to control journalists working there. "They assume that any journalist that isn't working with them is working against them," he said. In addition, short-lived abductions of groups of journalists who venture into conflict zones, usually by armed irregulars seeking publicity, are becoming more frequent. The threats and violence have taken a toll on news coverage, because editors are reluctant to send reporters into conflict areas, journalists and media observers say. "Until a few years ago, the map of violence in Colombia was clear and you knew there were armed groups in certain zones," said Daniel Coronel, director of television news for the RCN network. Some reporters also back away from stories. Carlos Alberto Giraldo, a reporter for the newspaper El Colombiano in Medellin, said he doesn't censor himself but sometimes thinks about his 7-year-old son and wonders "up to what point do you keep taking risks?" Some journalists, like Pulgarin, have to flee. Pulgarin was a reporter for the country's leading newspaper, El Tiempo. He was based deep in paramilitary-controlled territory in the northwestern city of Monteria and began receiving death threats after writing about bungled military operations and the killing of indigenous people by paramilitary groups. The threats began in June, with Pulgarin being accused of being a spokesman for the rebels. The threats continued even after he moved to another city. When he filed a complaint with prosecutors, Pulgarin received more threats. At one point, after he privately decided to leave, he was kidnapped and driven around in a taxi for 10 minutes with a gun held to his head. That incident was the last straw. Pulgarin said his wife and mother had repeatedly asked him to quit his newspaper job, but he always refused. "If every time a journalist is threatened he resigns, there will be no one to tell what's going on in Colombia," he said by telephone from a location kept secret. Gomez's foundation counted five journalists killed in 1999 because of their work. Three were killed in conflict zones in recent weeks--two television reporters shot in the head Nov. 28 while covering elections in a turbulent northeastern region and a cameraman killed Dec. 3 while covering a guerrilla attack in western Colombia. Much of the violence occurred in the late 1980s and early 1990s when the Medellin cartel, then the world's biggest drug gang, kidnapped and killed journalists and bombed newspaper offices. As terrifying as those years were, journalists had an easier time drawing the line between good and evil. "They were drug traffickers, bloodthirsty criminals that were attacking all of society," said Carlos Ruiz, news director for the Caracol radio network. The country's largest guerrilla band, the 15,000-member Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, has long been denounced by the government, U.S. officials and Colombian media as criminals who protect drug traffickers. But the FARC has been negotiating with the government since last January. One day a guerrilla leader is considered "the leader of band of kidnappers and drug terrorists," says Coronel at RCN. The next "he is the negotiating partner of the president." - --- MAP posted-by: Don Beck