Murdered Journalist is New Honorary Member

PEN Canada has adopted Mexican journalist José Armando Rodríguez Carreón, as an Honorary Member. Rodríguez was a veteran crime reporter for El Diario in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua. He was gunned down on November 13, 2008 by an unknown assailant. In July 2009, José Ibarra Limón, the lead investigator on Rodriguez' case, was assassinated. Within a month one of Ibarra's colleagues was also killed. All three murders remain unsolved. Two years after Rodríguez's murder "no legal process has begun to shed light on the crime" despite repeated assurances from the Mexican authorities. More here.

Writing for Rights

Former PEN Canada president Nino Ricci introduced the case of Nasrin Sotoudeh at Amnesty Canada's Write for Rights event at the Toronto Reference Library on Dec. 10. PEN Canada's programs coordinator also read a personal message from Ms. Sotoudeh's family. The Burmese poet Zargana, the subject of PEN Canada's previous joint action with Amnesty Canada, was released from a 45 year prison sentence in October 2011.

Taking it to the Streets

On November 15, Day of the Imprisoned Writer, PEN Canada volunteers invited members of the public to pose with portraits of the Iranian human rights lawyer and journalist Nasrin Sotoudeh, and Dawit Isaak, one of ten Eritrean journalists who have been held without formal charges or trials since September 2001. More information

View our Flickr photostream here

Remembering Mexico's Fallen Journalists

On November 2, PEN launched a Day of the Dead campaign to focus public attention on the appalling violence affecting journalists and writers in Mexico, and to mobilize pressure on the Mexican authorities to do more to end impunity. In Toronto, students at Martingrove Collegiate Institute held a Day of the Dead event in the school library on November 1.

Standing in a darkened room, next to an altar decorated with brightly coloured cloth, skulls and framed photographs of the fallen journalists, students read poems in Spanish and English.

Useful links:

Read Corruption, Impunity, Silence: The War on Mexico's Journalists, a report by the International Human Rights Program (IHRP) at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law and PEN Canada. English Spanish

The Other Side of Silence – Speaking out for Eritrea’s Imprisoned Journalists

On September 23, 2011 five Canadian authors spoke out for a group of Eritrean journalists imprisoned - without formal charges or trials - since September 2001. PEN Canada adopted nine of the arrested journalists as Honorary Members and has sent petitions and letters on their behalf for several years. (Four of the journalists have died while in prison.)

Click on the authors’ names to watch them reading their letters. Sheila Heti, Camilla Gibb, Karen Connelly, Susan Swan, Rosemary Sullivan

Read Charlie Foran's editorial in the Toronto Star.
View footage of the event at Ryerson.