Although in Nicaragua it has been impossible to carry out any protest or criticism against the government of Daniel Ortega for several years, the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (GHREN), attached to the United Nations, warned that the Government of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo continues to perpetrate serious systematic violations of human rights for political reasons, equivalent to “crimes against humanity.”
In a follow-up report presented to the United Nations Human Rights Council, during its 55th session on February 29, 2024, the experts denounce that the repression during 2023 experienced “an exponential pattern of violations focused on incapacitating any type of long-term opposition.
The Nicaraguan government's persecution of real or perceived opponents has become more subtle, according to GHREN, which is headed by German jurist Jan-Michael Simon.
“Rapes, abuses and crimes are perpetrated not only to dismantle the active efforts of the opposition, but also to eliminate all critical voices and deter, in the long term, any new organization and initiative of social mobilization,” he insists.
In March 2023, the GHREN presented a first report on the situation in Nicaragua and concluded from the outset that Ortega and Murillo, as well as officials from agencies and structures of the Sandinista regime, “have committed and continue to commit serious and systematic violations and abuses of rights.” human rights” and crimes against humanity.
On this new occasion, experts highlight more crimes against humanity, such as exile and statelessness against 317 Nicaraguans.
“These crimes were perpetrated in the context of a discriminatory policy intentionally applied from the highest levels of the Government, which constitutes prima facie the crime against humanity, of persecution for political reasons,” underlines the document that was shared with EL PAÍS.
Extraterritorial persecution
“Nicaragua is trapped in a spiral of violence marked by the persecution of all forms of political opposition, real or perceived, both at home and abroad.
Furthermore, the Government has consolidated a spiral of silence that incapacitates any potential opposition,” Simon said in his speech before the Human Rights Council.
A new element that the GHREN highlights is that Ortega-Murillo's repression has extended beyond the borders of Nicaragua, that is, it is already extraterritorial.
“Given the effects of the deprivation of his nationality and legal personality, the lack of access to official documentation and consular support, as well as other violations that prevent family reunification and widely affect the conditions for subsistence,” explained expert Ángela Buitrago .
People who were Nicaraguan nationals are stateless without the right to legal remedies;
Many others suffer from similar conditions caused by statelessness, Buitrago lamented.
In turn, the relatives of victims of human rights violations are targeted by the Government only because they are related to real or perceived opponents.
These “violations by extension” are particularly serious when it comes to boys and girls.
“Boys and girls have been violated due to their parental relationship or the activities and/or opinions expressed by their parents or family members.
Deportations and entry bans into Nicaragua have resulted in the separation of several children from their parents.
"Several of them have been denied the issuance of valid passports to join their parents abroad," adds a press release released by the GHREN team.
Experts documented 145 cases of Nicaraguans who were banned from entering the country.
This act shows a pattern of violation that violates the right to freedom of movement and free choice of residence, and in turn, leaves the victims with conditions of great vulnerability similar to those caused by statelessness.
Chain of command
In its first report, the GHREN discharged responsibility for crimes against humanity against the presidential couple, but on this occasion they have gone further: they identified the repressive chain of command of the Sandinista apparatus within various institutions, bodies and agencies of the State.
“The Group identified that the president [Ortega] and the vice president [Murillo] give orders and instructions – directly or through trusted advisors – to the different institutions that have to carry out repressive acts against real or perceived opponents and their families” , collects the report.
The experts reiterated that the “instrumentalization of all powers of the State,” especially the Judiciary, has prevented proceedings from being initiated against the authors of the repression.
Rather, it has protected them from accountability with the amnesty law, approved in June 2019. The group gives as an example the case of Brazilian student Raynéia Lima, murdered in 2018 by a Sandinista paramilitary.
In this case, they warn that impunity extends to foreign jurisdictions.
“The Brazilian Public Ministry told the lawyers of Lima's mother 'that the Government of Nicaragua had refused to accede to the request for international legal assistance from the Brazilian authorities', who asked to see the file of the person responsible for her death.
The reason was because the culprit was released under amnesty,” reports GHREN.
Independent expert Ariela Peralta insisted that the centralization of power not only guarantees impunity for perpetrators, but also undermines efforts to achieve accountability.
“The Government has made sure to remain in an increasingly solid bubble to perpetuate itself in power and annihilate anyone who tries to break that bubble,” she said.
Another appeal to the international community
In light of these new findings, United Nations experts once again issued a strong appeal to the international community.
“President Ortega, Vice President [Rosario] Murillo and the high-level officials identified in the investigation must be held accountable to the international community, as must Nicaragua as a state that persecutes its own people, targeting university students, indigenous peoples, Afro-descendant peoples, peasants and members of the Catholic Church and other Christian confessions,” said Jan Simon.
The Group urged the international community to take immediate action, in particular by expanding sanctions against individuals and institutions involved in human rights violations.
“Sanctions are a minimum form of accountability in a country where impunity and the criminalization of democracy are the rule,” experts recommend.
In this sense, they ask the international community to make use of their conclusions on security, financial and commercial relations and policies, whether within the framework of the Financial Action Task Force, the International Monetary Fund, or when it conditions access. Nicaragua's preferential agreement to markets on the fulfillment of non-trade policy objectives, among other things.
The Ortega-Murillo regime rejected the report under the argument that the experts, for their report, took “input from manipulated criteria, from people financed to distort reality.”
“The effect on the Nicaraguan population is devastating.
It will take the people of Nicaragua and the international community a significant amount of time and resources to recover everything lost under the government of President Ortega and Vice President Murillo,” lamented Jan-Michael Simon.
Follow all the information from El PAÍS América on
and
X
, or in our
weekly newsletter
.