(Bloomberg) — Authorities are investigating the death of a journalist who was shot and killed in Michoacan state as violence against media workers in Mexico surges.
Armando Linares Lopez was killed in a private residence and suffered gunshot wounds, the state prosecutor’s office said on Twitter.
Linares worked with the media outlet Monitor Michoacan and he’s the second journalist with that publication to be killed this year. Linares had complained of threats against him and his coworkers after the murder of his colleague Roberto Toledo in late January, newspaper El Financiero reported.
Mexico has seen a rash of journalist homicides with at least eight so far this year. That’s led to international calls for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s government to take action to stem the violence, including from U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the European Parliament.
AMLO, as the president is known, called on Blinken not to interfere and likened the European Parliament to “sheep” for joining attacks against him by Mexico’s opposition. The lawmakers said AMLO should stop criticizing journalists, especially amid a wave of violence against them.
Read More: Mexican Leader Calls European Lawmakers ‘Sheep’ in Angry Letter
The president has lashed out against a growing number of reporters he says oppose him. He has defended his administration’s human rights record, saying that the government is investigating the homicides and has made arrests in most of the cases.
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