Newsman at Risk in Colombia Gets Help (in the U.S.)

[Judi Lynn]

Newsman at Risk in Colombia Gets Help
The journalist and his family have been threatened because of his coverage of drugs.
By Lee Romney, Times Staff Writer
October 2, 2006


KENSINGTON, Calif. — Colombian journalist Daniel Coronell had been in California for nearly a full academic year before he shared the depth of his dilemma with colleagues at his Stanford University fellowship program: Death threats targeting him, his wife and small daughter had prompted the family to flee his homeland, he confided at an emotional dinner party.

He feared it was not yet safe to return.

The man they knew as gentle and self-effacing had built a formidable reputation as one of Colombia's most courageous journalists. He is news director of the television program "Noticias Uno," which the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists calls "one of Colombia's few independent news sources."

For two decades, his reporting has illuminated links among drug traffickers, right-wing paramilitary squads and the country's political elite.
(snip)

Subsequent coverage focused on now-President and former Sen. Alvaro Uribe Velez, whom U.S. intelligence officials in 1991 described as "dedicated to collaboration with the Medellin cartel at high government levels."
(snip/...)

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-colombian2oct02,1,4819899.story?page=1&coll=la-headlines-california&track=crosspromo