The president of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), Julissa Mantilla, affirmed this Friday before the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS) that the commission continues to pay “particular attention” to Nicaragua to monitor the “serious crisis” that it has been facing since 2018 due to the “continuous weakening of democratic institutions and the installation of a de facto state of exception.”
In this sense, he expressed his commitment to continue observing the situation of political prisoners in this country in order to promote compliance with their fundamental rights and freedoms.
“The IACHR will continue to be the voice of those who have no voice and turn to it as their last hope to access Justice,” concluded Mantilla.
In this sense, the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh) applauded the position of the head of the IACHR on the situation of human rights violations in Nicaragua and endorsed these statements.
? Pdta. of the @IACHR Dr. @JulissaMantill6 presented the 2021 annual report of the IACHR during the fourth plenary session of the 52nd General Assembly of the @OEA_oficial highlighting that through #MESENI have paid special attention to the situation in Nicaragua. pic.twitter.com/0tns1P7mic
— Cenidh (@cenidh) October 7, 2022
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The official also expressed her concern about the “persistence of discrimination and different forms of violence” against the most vulnerable groups in the region.
During his speech at the LII General Assembly of the OAS, which is being held in Lima, Mantilla stressed that the pandemic “continued to accentuate the vulnerability of groups in a situation of historical discrimination, in the context of the global economic recession and the climate emergency that aggravated poverty, inequality and social exclusion”.
“The commission registered the persistence of discrimination and the different forms of violence against women, LGTBIQ+ people, Afro-descendants, indigenous people, boys, girls, adolescents, the elderly and people with disabilities,” she declared, after recalling that she is the first Peruvian female president in the history of the IACHR.
Worrying trends
Mantilla added that, during 2021, the commission identified “a set of worrying trends made with the weakening of national human rights institutions and the closure of democratic spaces through laws and initiatives that restrict the right of association, participation, peaceful assembly, as well as freedom of expression”.
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In this scenario, he continued, the IACHR observed “stigmatizing pronouncements” against people who defend human rights on the continent and highlighted the “special concern” in the face of violence against social leaders and journalists.
In turn, he assured that last year there was a “tendency to limit social protest, even through its criminalization”, and warned about the intensification of the militarization of citizen security tasks in some countries.
It also noted “with concern” the situations faced by groups in conditions of human mobility, as well as trends that “could undermine the independence of the judiciary” in some states.
