In less than a week, another femicide has been reported in the North Caribbean area of Nicaragua. The new victim of sexist violence was identified as Marisol Alarcon29 years old, who was shot to death by her partner Vicente Ávila.
The crime occurred at dawn on Monday, May 1, in the San Alberto community, located 31 kilometers from Waspam, on the banks of the Coco River, which serves as the natural border between Nicaragua and Honduras.
According to the residents, the victim’s body was found in the house where she lived.
Related news: Police search for suspect in murder of mother and daughter in North Caribbean
In addition, they indicated that the suspect fled after committing the crime, for which the National Police seeks to find his whereabouts. It is believed that the subject managed to escape to Honduras.
This femicide is the third to be reported in less than a week in Nicaragua, after the murder of Reyna López Pérez, 37, and her daughter with the initials MLP, 13in the Kwuiwi Tingni indigenous community, in Waspam.
Wave of femicides in Nicaragua
The number of femicides in Nicaragua continues to rise. In the first four months of 2023, the Observatorio Voces, from the feminist organization Catholics for the Right to Decide (CDD), has registered that at least 36 women have been victims of sexist violence.
The agency detailed that, between January and April 2023, 25 of the 36 femicides were committed in the national territory and 11 were perpetrated abroad: five in Costa Rica, four in the United States, one in Mexico and another in Guatemala, countries where entire families have emigrated due to the repression of the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo or because of the overwhelming poverty that Nicaraguans experience.
A CDD member told Article 66 that, of the 25 women murdered in Nicaragua, eleven of these crimes have occurred on the country’s Caribbean coast and warned that there is a rise in femicides in the North Caribbean area.
In addition, he specified that of the total number of femicides, three of these violent acts were to the detriment of minors. “The degree of disinterest and commitment (of the authorities) to the lives of women and girls is worrying,” said the human rights defender, alarmed by the increase in sexist violence.
