Guillermo Cano Isaza

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Guillermo Cano Isaza (Medellín, 12 August 1925 – Bogotá, 17 December 1986) was a Colombian journalist.

The editor of the daily El Espectador, he was murdered in front of the paper's offices by two hitmen linked to Colombia's drug cartels. It was assumed that the attack was in reprisal for a campaign he had launched in the paper to denounce the influence of drug traffickers in the country's politics. The same building was destroyed in a bomb attack three years later.

In an October 1995 ruling, four individuals (María Ofelia Saldarriaga, Pablo Enrique Zamora, Carlos Martínez Hernández and Luis Carlos Molina Yepes) were found guilty of conspiring to commit his murder and sentenced to prison terms of 16 years, 8 months. However, on appeal, the convictions of all but Molina were overturned.

Guillermo Cano was the heir of Fidel Cano, the founder of El Espectador. As a journalist he had worked on the paper's bullfighting, sports, cultural and political sections. He had served as the editor of El Espectador since 1952.

In 1997 UNESCO created an annual prize that bears his name – the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize – which serves to honour a person or institution that has done outstanding work in defending the freedom of the press.

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The original version of this article was translated, with minor adaptations and additions, from the corresponding article on the Spanish-language Wikipedia.