Alemán: In Nicaragua, jail or death to those who protest 6:33
(CNN Spanish) -
The Nicaraguan Prosecutor's Office reported this Thursday that it formally accused the opposition student leader Lesther Alemán of conspiracy against national integrity.
Alemán and Max Jerez, leaders of the Nicaraguan University Alliance (AUN), have been detained since July 5 and investigated by the police - without showing evidence - on suspicion of being "leaders of seizures and destruction" of the Polytechnic University and the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, where according to the authorities "they committed crimes of robbery with intimidation (assaults), kidnappings, serious injuries, rapes, extortion" during which the Government describes as a failed coup attempt in 2018. They are also pointed out of alleged actions against national sovereignty.
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Alemán gained notoriety in the first national dialogue due to the socio-political crisis, when he asked President Daniel Ortega to resign.
Shortly before being arrested, he recorded a video that was released by the Nicaraguan University Alliance and in which he said he was prepared for death or jail and denied the accusations:
"On which I do insist: I am not a traitor to the country, I have never done anything against Nicaraguans. Nor am I guilty of a crime that is charged to me, I have not resorted to any strategy of violence, nor have I acted outside the framework legal, as far as the Constitution allows me, for that reason I am clean, they would have me as an adornment in the jail scene ", expressed Alemán.
The Public Ministry also reported that political commentator Jaime Arellano was accused of conspiracy against national integrity.
Arellano was arrested at his home on June 24 and remains under police surveillance there.
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CNN has not been able to reach attorneys for any of the defendants.
Their relatives claim that they have been denied the right to see their defenders.
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The Prosecutor's Office added that after the hearings on Thursday, the judicial authority decreed preventive detention for the accused.
During the last week, the Public Ministry has reported the formal accusation "for conspiracy to undermine national integrity" against at least a dozen opponents of the 35 detained since May 28 to date.
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According to the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights, it is a strategy to annul the opposition by the November 7 elections.
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The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, through the Follow-up Mechanism to Nicaragua (Meseni), expressed on its social networks this Friday that it "continues to monitor the situation of people arbitrarily detained in the electoral context, who have been accused by the Prosecutor's Office for alleged crimes of 'conspiracy to undermine national integrity' and money laundering "
El Meseni "learned about visits by relatives to detained persons and expresses concern about the information about deplorable conditions in which they are, contrary to human rights standards," he said.
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