NYC Indymedia videographer killed, other journalists injured, covering Oaxaca City protests
New York City Indymedia journalist Bradley Will, 36, was shot in the chest Friday covering protests in Oaxaca City, Mexico. He died before reaching the hospital, according to La Jornada. Oswaldo Ramirez, a photographer from the newspaper Milenio Diario, who was at Will's side, was shot in the foot and reported injured, his status unknown, according to NYC Indymedia reports. Will was a Steal This Radio (Lower East Side, 88.7-FM) alum, according to Al Giordano at Narco News. Even the Associated Press is pointing fingers at the police, and there seems to be many photos, and, presumably, the video footage Will was shooting at the time. Other reports on the NYC Indymedia site say that three others are dead, and a Radio Universidad member was injured. Radio APPO, the radio of the Assembly Popular of the Oaxacan People, are reporting truckloads of armed paramilitaries entering the city. Listen to Spanish feed:
Radio APPO.
posted by Tom Roe @ 12:15 AM
1 Comments:
Brad Will was killed on October 27, 2006, in Oaxaca, Mexico, while
working as a journalist for the global Indymedia network. He was shot
in
the torso while documenting an armed, paramilitary assault on the
Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca, a fusion of striking local
teachers and other community organizations demanding democracy
in Mexico.
The members of the New York City Independent Media Center mourn the
loss
of this inspiring colleague and friend. We want to thank everyone who
has sent condolences to our office and posted remembrances to
www.nyc.indymedia.org. We share our grief with the people of our city
and beyond who lived, worked, and struggled with Brad over the course
of
his dynamic but short life. We can only imagine the pain of the people
of Oaxaca who have lost seven of their neighbors to this fight,
including Emilio Alonso Fabian, a teacher, and who now face an invasion
by federal troops.
All we want in compensation for his death is the only thing Brad ever
wanted to see in this world: justice.
* We, along with all of Brad's friends, reject the use of further
state-sponsored violence in Oaxaca.
* The New York City Independent Media Center supports the demand
of
Reporters Without Borders for a full and complete investigation by
Mexican authorities into Oaxaca State Governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz's
continued use of plain-clothed municipal police as a political
paramilitary force. The arrest of his assailants is not enough.
* The NYC IMC also supports the call of Zapatista Subcomandante
Insurgente Marcos "to compañeros and compañeras in other countries to
unite and to demand justice for this dead compañero." Marcos issued
this
call "especially to all of the alternative media, and free media here
in
Mexico and in all the world."
Indymedia was born from the Zapatista vision of a global network of
alternative communication against neoliberalism and for humanity. To
believe in Indymedia is to believe that journalism is either in the
service of justice or it is a cause of injustice. We speak and listen,
resist and struggle. In that spirit, Brad Will was both a journalist
and
a human rights activist.
He was a part of this movement of independent journalists who go where
the corporate media do not or stay long after they are gone. Perhaps
Brad's death would have been prevented if Mexican, international, and
US
media corporations had told the story of the Oaxacan people. Then those
of us who live in comfort would not only be learning now about this 5
month old strike, or about this 500 year old struggle.
And then Brad might not have felt the need to face down those assassins
in Oaxaca holding merely the ineffective shields of his US passport and
prensa extranjera badge. Then Brad would not have joined the
fast-growing list of journalists killed in action, or the much longer
list of those killed in recent years by troops defending entrenched,
unjust power in Latin America.
Still, those of us who knew Brad know that his work would never have
been completed. From the community gardens of the Lower East Side to
the
Movimento Sem Terra encampments of Brazil, he would have continued to
travel to where the people who make this world a beautiful place are
resisting those who would cause it further death and destruction. Now,
in his memory, we will all travel those roads. We are the network, all
of us who speak and listen, all of us who resist.
The New York City Independent Media Center
www.nyc.indymedia.org
4 W. 43rd St., Suite 311
New York, N.Y. 10036
USA / EEUU
212-221-0521
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