RSF - Reporters sans frontières
RSF - Reporters sans frontières
10/08/2024 | Press release | Archived content
Zamora's trial postponed to 2025: RSF and allied organisations demand his immediate release
In the same month that journalist and director of elPeriódico, Jose Rubén Zamora, spent his 800th day in prison, the Guatemalan Supreme Court of Justice announced that the retrial for the money laundering case will not take place until September 2025. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and allied organisations repeat their urgent demand for the journalist's immediate and unconditional release and urge the Public Prosecutor's Office, the judiciary, and President Bernardo Arévalo to proceed in a swift, fair, and impartial manner to free the journalist.
"On 7 October, Zamora completed 800 days in arbitrary detention. It has been almost three years of a process marked by irregularities, delays, and postponements, even though international bodies such as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and the United Nations have already attested to the violations of the journalist's rights and called for his immediate release. RSF strongly condemns the excessive postponement of Zamora's trial, an abusive and cruel tactic consistently used to keep this journalist behind bars. We call on President Bernardo Arévalo to turn his words into concrete actions by preventing these unjust postponements and helping free Zamora.
Artur Romeu
Director of RSF's Latin America bureau
Published on08.10.2024