The International Press Institute (IPI), a global network of editors, media executives and leading journalists for media freedom, today condemned an attempt by a leading Spanish politician to jail two journalists who revealed her alleged involvement in a fraud scandal.

In documents filed this week in court, the politician, Cristina Cifuentes, the former president of the Community of Madrid, accused the two journalists, eldiario.es Founder and Editor-in-Chief Ignacio Escolar and investigative journalist Raquel Ejerique, of aggravated disclosure of confidential information.

The criminal complaint seeks to jail Escolar and Ejerique for up to five years. It accuses the pair of having acted “blindly” in pursuit of a “valuable exclusive”.

Eldiario.es launched a series of reports on March 21, written by Ejerique, explaining how Cifuentes had allegedly obtained her master’s degree from Rey Juan Carlos University through fraud. The information published by the news site generated great public interest in Spain and put political pressure on Cifuentes, who eventually stepped down several weeks later following an unrelated shoplifting scandal. The reports also prompted a criminal investigation into Cifuentes for falsifying public documents and bribery.

IPI Deputy Director Scott Griffen called the charges filed by Cifuentes a “blatant and clumsy attack on media freedom in Spain”.

“Pursuing a story is not a crime”, he said. “Ignacio Escolar and Raquel Ejerique are being targeted because they did their job. The court should dismiss this case quickly and with prejudice.”

The Madrid-based Platform in Defence of Free Expression (PDLI), an IPI partner, also condemned Cifuentes’s move. PDLI said it feared that the case may be an effort to expose the journalists’ source, “whose protection is one of the professional duties of journalists. In that case, it would be a serious attack on the constitutional right to inform and be informed and an unacceptable threat against investigative journalism.”

Earlier this year, an IPI special feature described the pattern by which Spanish politicians resort to unfounded legal actions against investigative journalists to stop their reporting.