Brian Nichols, United States Deputy Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, pointed out that “Nicaragua is on the way to being expelled from the OAS” during an appearance before the Subcommittee of the House of Representatives of Congress, in which he addressed the relations of the North American country in the region.
When questioned about the situation in Nicaragua as part of his testimony before the Subcommittee of the House of Representatives, Nichols recalled that Washington supported the condemnation resolutions of the Organization of American States (OAS) against the Ortega regime and that bilaterally imposed sanctions to key officials of the dictatorship after the votes of November 7, 2021, reported the portal La Voz de América.
“They are on their way to being expelled from the Organization of American States with the direction they are going,” Nichols responded to lawmakers at the hearing, which addressed US priorities in Latin America.
The figure of expulsion is not contemplated in the Inter-American Democratic Charter. What article 21 of the same establishes is that, when the General Assembly, summoned to a special period of sessions, finds that there has been a breakdown of the democratic order in a Member State, it will make the decision to suspend that State from exercising of their right to participate in the OAS with the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the member states —24 votes out of 34—. Suspension shall take effect immediately.
Analysts have warned that after the resolution of the OAS General Assembly of Foreign Ministers on November 12, 2021 in which he points out as “illegitimate” the votes of November 7 in Nicaragua, in which Daniel Ortega was re-elected without political competition, the country is increasingly placed closer to the suspension of the regional body.
“The Secretary General (of the OAS) is in charge of meeting with the Ortega Murillo regime to discuss his behavior. However, they have not yet received it,” Nichols added at his appearance, according to the report by The Voice of America.
Undersecretary Nichols refers to the efforts made by the OAS Secretary General, Luis Almagro, to negotiate with Ortega so that he would agree to discuss with a high-level commission of the regional organization and agree to hold new elections in Nicaragua, with transparency and credible observation.
Almagro presented last January 19 a report about these efforts in which he reported that he had not received responses from the regime to his requests, but added that formally “the Government has not yet said no” to the possibility of accepting to work with the regional body to agree to hold new elections .
Almagro’s position has been strongly criticized, arguing that it is “a fiasco” and even a kind of capitulation by the secretary general in relation to the sociopolitical crisis in Nicaragua.
Nicaragua began a process of leaving the OAS on November 19 of last year, arguing that the organization’s latest resolutions on the socio-political crisis “undermined the sovereignty and self-determination of the peoples” and demonstrated that the regional entity “was an instrument of imperialism from United States”.
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