Juan Pablo Cárdenas Squella, winner of the 2005 National Journalism Prize, died of cancer in the early hours of Sunday, October 11, at age 76. He founded and edited Análisis magazine, one of the leading media outlets opposed to Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship.
According to El Mostrador, Cárdenas faced detentions, overnight imprisonment and attacks because of his journalism. The website Desenfoque reported that he died at 2 a.m. and had chosen not to make his illness public.
Born on December 1, 1949, he founded Análisis in 1977, according to Desenfoque. The magazine provided space to expose human rights violations and give a voice to those excluded from media outlets under the military regime's control.
That work came at a personal cost. Desenfoque reports that he was detained 17 times, while El Mostrador refers to multiple occasions. Both outlets agree that he served 18 months of overnight imprisonment: he slept in prison and returned to the newsroom during the day. His home was set on fire on two occasions.
His situation prompted international solidarity. Foreign journalists accompanied him as he entered prison each night. In 1987, he received the Golden Pen of Freedom from the World Association of Newspapers, and in 2000 the International Press Institute named him one of its World Press Freedom Heroes.
He also received the Latin American Journalism Prize and the Vladimir Herzog human rights award from Brazil and the Monsignor Leonidas Proaño human rights award from Ecuador. In 2005, he received the National Journalism Prize, which recognized his independence and his defense of freedom of expression.
When accepting it, he extended the recognition to the generation of journalists who confronted the dictatorship's restrictions on information and contributed to the restoration of democracy.
After Análisis, he edited Debate Universitario, helped create Los Tiempos and the online newspaper Primera Línea, and served as press attaché at the Chilean Embassy in Mexico. According to Desenfoque, he headed Radio Universidad de Chile for 18 years.
He was an academic at the University of Chile's Institute of Communication and Image, where he taught hundreds of students. He wrote more than a dozen books, including "Crónicas impertinentes", "Desobediencia debida" and his autobiography "Un peligro para la sociedad".
In May of this year, he published his final book, "Revista Análisis, crónicas inolvidables", for free on his website. He is survived by his wife, Patricia, and his children. The family has yet to confirm the dates of the wake and funeral.
