LIMA, Peru (AP) — At age 75, one of Latin America’s most storied journalists had been looking forward to weaving into books the fragmented threads of more than four decades of investigative reporting that exposed high-level abuse of power in Peru and abroad.
In an illustrious career, Gustavo Gorriti has endured death threats from drug traffickers, survived Peru’s harrowing Shining Path insurgency and a kidnapping by silencer-toting military intelligence agents during a 1992 presidential power grab.
Then an aggressive lymphatic cancer struck, wasting the former five-time national judo champion’s robust physique. Diagnosed in August, Gorriti was in the final drips of two months of chemotherapy in December when a different kind of body blow landed.
A smear campaign — amplified by complicit, cowed or indifferent broadcast and print media — portrayed the self-styled “intelligence agent for the people” as Public Enemy No. 1, a ruthless, egotistical victimizer of innocents.
US overdose deaths dropped in 2023, the first time since 2018
Two in custody after armed police swarm Auckland suburb
Ministry of Health 'taking the time to get it right' on puberty blockers
Kiwi musicians boycott US festival SXSW due to defence industry sponsors
Sarah Jessica Parker divides opinion with enormous hat on set of And Just Like That
Majority of young New Zealanders want to 'live in a smoke free nation'
Staff shortages holding up prison improvements
Doctors who visited Gaza speak of 'atrocities', collapsing healthcare
Storms damage homes in Oklahoma and Kansas. But in Houston, most power is restored
Christchurch Adventure Park to reopen on Friday, 22 March
Bella Hadid goes braless in a thigh
Majority of young New Zealanders want to 'live in a smoke free nation'