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Alert

Police officer and two other suspects arrested for attempted murder of tabloid reporter

(RSF/IFEX) - On 7 September 2006, the police announced that three people had been arrested for the attempted murder of reporter Roger Panizal of the tabloid newspaper "Tiktik" on 14 August in Valenzuela, near Manila. One of the detainees is a police officer. Another is suspected of being the mastermind.

Panizal was shot in the neck and hand and spent several days close to death before beginning to recover. Nonetheless he was able, from his hospital bed, to identify someone known as George Demonyo ("George the Devil") as his assailant.

At the beginning of August, President Gloria Arroyo gave the police and justice department a 10-week deadline to solve ten cases of journalists and left-wing activists who have been murdered, but few arrests have been made so far.

Reporters Without Borders calls on the security forces to redouble their efforts in order to put an end to the climate of violence that has made the Philippines the second-most dangerous country in the world for journalists, after Iraq.