El Tiempo: Dirty Tricks or Just Bad Journalism?

This morning’s El Tiempo published a photo given to it by the Colombian National Police reportedly otained from one of Raul Reyes’ laptops showing a picture of the slain guerrilla leader with a person El Tiempo claimed was Ecuadorian Security Minister Gustavo Larrea. It was later revealed that the man meeting with Reyes is actually Argentinian Communist Party leader Patricio Echegaray. The Ecuadorian government responded with an angry communique asking El Tiempo to respect international journalistic norms. El Tiempo later published an apology. The photo also caused a stir in the Organization of American States meeting in Washington D.C. where Ecuadorian ambassador Cocíos stated that “this is nothing more than a Colombian dirty trick to try to discredit the National Government of Ecuador”.

Once again (see other posts in this blog), El Tiempo has demonstrated a remarkable willingness to publish just about anything the government tells it to, which makes one seriously question the paper’s journalistic integrity and its independence from the Uribe administration. Uribe’s vice president Francisco Santos and defense minister Juan Manuel Santos are close relatives (nephew and son, respectively) of El Tiempo’s editor Enrique Santos.