PLAÇA REIAL — Foreign Minister Dolors Esteve yesterday summoned the chargé d'affaires of a neighbouring regional power to the Palau de Govern, following what the Ministry described as "deeply troubling reports" concerning the detention of two freelance correspondents believed to hold dual Almarian citizenship. The summons, issued by note verbale in the forenoon, was executed by mid-afternoon.

Speaking upon the steps of the Palau, the Minister declared that freedom of the press "is not a negotiable courtesy but a cornerstone of civilised governance," and confirmed that Almaria would place the matter upon the agenda of the next sitting of the Mediterranean Compact. She declined to name the power in question, a reticence that diplomatic correspondents in these quarters understood as customary rather than evasive.

The detained correspondents, whose identities the Ministry has withheld pending consular contact, are understood to have been filing on questions of economic governance and civic assembly. Their passports, according to the Ministry's note, were confiscated upon arrest. The Herald has this morning written to the families of both correspondents offering whatever assistance its own modest international desk may furnish.

The Herald's editorial board observed, in an unsigned column published yesterday, that press-freedom indices tracked by international monitors have reached their lowest recorded levels in a generation. The board cautioned that the tide "laps even at our own shores if we are not vigilant" — a phrase that has been noted, in certain corners of the Chamber, with more feeling than its authors perhaps intended.

This newspaper, founded in 1882 under a charter that pledged its columns to the truth as its editors best discerned it, associates itself unreservedly with the Foreign Minister's statement. On this question, at least, there is no faction in Almaria Vella and no party on the Plaça Reial; there is only the principle.