This October 27 marks the International Day of Religious Freedom, but in Nicaragua it was a gray commemoration. The country faces the cruelest repression against the faith in its history, which has escalated to the level of crimes against humanity, after six years of persecution, prison, exile against religious people, and confiscations against religious institutions.
The Ortega Murillo dictatorship maintains a true war against faith from which no religious denomination has escaped. The regime’s attacks have included the Catholic, Evangelical and Moravian churches.
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The Nicaragua Never Again Human Rights Collective, which will present its most recent report on religious freedom on October 30, records, from 2022 to date, the arbitrary imprisonment of at least 74 religious people, including two bishops, in addition to priests, deacons and delegates of the word, in addition to 11 evangelical pastors from the Puerta de la Montaña church.
The repression of the dictatorship has also included the banishment, denationalization, prohibition of entry into the country and expulsions of more than 450 Nicaraguans, among them nuns from various Christian orders, as well as the prohibition of congregations and expulsion of their members such as the Capuchin Friars Minor. , the Carmelite Sisters of the Divine Heart of Jesus, the Augustinian monks and nuns, the Mercedarian Missionaries of Bérriz, the Association of Trappist Sisters, and the Brothers of Charity.
The tyranny has stripped 35 religious people of their nationality. He has exiled 63 religious. Likewise, the Nicaragua Never Again Collective has documented in recent months 14 cases of victims of arbitrary detention, seven secular people and seven religious, all victims of torture.
The defense organization has recorded the confiscation and illegalization of at least 1,200 religious NGOs, as well as media outlets related to Catholic and evangelical churches that have been closed and also confiscated.
For all these repressive actions, the Group of Experts on Human Rights on Nicaragua (GHREN), of the United Nations (UN), in its report of July 2024, stated that the Nicaraguan dictators, various institutions of their regime and public officials have perpetrated “crimes against humanity” against religious denominations in the nation.
For UN experts, the dictator Daniel Ortega and his wife, the vice-dictator Rosario Murillo, are the main instigators of hatred against the Church in Nicaragua and those who have ordered all the repressive actions against religious institutions in the country, involving various State institutions and therefore, they are the main perpetrators of “crimes against humanity” against religion.
Medardo Mairena calls on the world to stand in solidarity with Christians in Nicaragua
The peasant opposition leader and former political prisoner banished by the dictatorship, Medardo Mairena, recalled on this day that people of faith in Nicaragua are being repressed and called on the world to show solidarity with the believers of the Central American country.
«On Religious Freedom Day, Nicaraguans call on all people who profess a faith to stand in solidarity with a people who are denied, by a cruel dictatorship, a fundamental human right, recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in its article 18,” said the opposition leader when referring to the right to a religious belief.
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Likewise, he criticized that depriving an entire nation of a right essential to human dignity that allows us to express our beliefs and values ”is a crime against humanity, which affects peaceful coexistence between people of different beliefs.”
“Religious persecution with prison, exile, torture, looting of property, attacks on temples and closures of study centers, demands a firm global condemnation,” said the Nicaraguan peasant leader.
