Overcoming the U.S. Visa Denial of a Colombian Nieman Fellow

Giles presents the case of investigative rHoliman said the denial was based on accusations by the Colombian government linking him to the leftist guerrilla group FARC. His probing television reports had disclosed abuses by the country's intelligence agency, angering the Colombian government. Particularly, he said, his travel to southern Colombia to interview senior FARC leaders for a documentary on kidnappings had raised suspicions. He shared his fears that these serious allegations would endanger his life. The government of the United States, with its longstanding commitment to press freedom worldwide, was turning away a journalist whose ground-breaking work had exposed him to persecution by his own government and the grave possibility of personal violence. Colombian officials have accused Morris of being "close to the guerrillas" and "an accomplice of terrorism," but the State Department's denial made little sense against its own history of granting him visas to enter the US to accept awards and make speeches. eporter, Hollman Morris, being denied a US visa to travel to Cambridge for his Nieman Fellowship.