MEXICO CITY: A journalist has been murdered in southeast Mexico, not far from tourist hotspot Can­cun, the government said on Tuesday — the seventh such killing this year in the country.

“Ruben Pat, manager at the Playa News weekly, was shot dead this morning” in the Playa del Carmen area, the Quintana Roo state government announced.

Pat was the second journalist from Playa News based in Playa del Carmen, which is located south of Cancun along the Carib­bean Sea, murdered in less than a month, after his colleague Jose Guadalupe Chan.

Prosecutors said Pat was shot at about 6am outside a bar. Emergency services pronounced him dead upon arriving at the scene.

Prosecutors said the incident was meant to “intimidate” other journalists.

Playa News demanded answers from the state government about Pat’s murder on its Facebook page.

Mexico was the second most dangerous place in the world for journalists last year, behind only civil war-torn Syria, with 11 murdered, according to Reporters Without Borders.

According to various freedom of speech organisations, more than 100 have been killed in the country since 2000.

The vast majority of those crimes have gone unpunished.

Journalism isn’t the only risky profession in Mexico.

Between September and presidential elections on July 1, at least 145 politicians were killed.

Five of the eight most violent cities in the world are located in Mexico, according to government statistics for 2017.

Los Cabos in the country’s northwest topped that list with 111 mur-ders per 100,000 citizens.

Published in Dawn, July 25th, 2018