The writer and former vice president of Nicaragua, Sergio Ramírez, winner of the 2018 Cervantes Prize, described as “sad and terrible” the confirmation of the death of General Hugo Torres, one of the heroes of the fight against Somoza who was arrested last year and turned into a political hostage by the Daniel Ortega regime.
Ramírez, who is in exile to protect his integrity due to threats of arrest, said that Torres was a “fighter all his life”, since twice he was part of heroic actions of guerrilla commandos that fought the Somocista dynasty: the taking of the residence of former Somocista minister José María Castillo in 1974 and that of the National Palace four years later.
“He freed Ortega from prison with the first of them (the seizure of the former minister’s house) and he dies in an Ortega prison. We must see and listen to the will he left when his capture was imminent, a lesson in serene dignity and integrity, ”said Ramírez.
In that video, cited by Ramírez, Torres denounced a strong police presence in the surroundings of his residence, along with surveillance with drones beforehand, which he described, together with the captures of other colleagues from his party, as “swipes of a regime that feels dying, that has no legal basis, that has no justification whatsoever”.
Torres mentioned in that video Dora María Téllez, who had been captured by the Ortega dictatorship hours before and who shares with him her participation in the taking of the National Palace. She was sentenced last February 10 to eight years in prison for the alleged crime of “conspiracy to undermine national integrity” in one of the processes activated by the dictatorship against political prisoners.
Former guerrilla commander Mónica Baltodano questioned the silence of the Ortega regime and the Police in the case of Torres, from his arbitrary arrest until his death on February 12. “There has not been a single statement, a single pronouncement, a single information, not only from his immediate jailers who are the people from the Directorate of Judicial Assistance or the Ortega Police, but not from his real jailers, those who give the order. of these absurd captures that are Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo”, he expressed
Baltodano gave these statements to CONFIDENTIAL shortly after noon. At 3:00 pm, the Public Ministry reported in a brief statement that Torres, who is not referred to as a retired general, was transferred to a hospital and that he was in the company of two of his children.
“The MP upon learning of the seriousness of the disease, for humanitarian reasons, asked the judicial authority for the definitive suspension of the beginning of the oral and public trial, which was authorized by the court,” they explained in the statement.
The Prosecutor’s Office thus ignored the precarious conditions in which the former guerrilla was held and the impact that these had on the deterioration of his health.
The regime captured Torres on June 13 after raiding his home and as part of a hunt against the leadership of the Unión Democrática Renovadora (Unamos). For Baltodano it is necessary to reiterate “and say forcefully that Hugo Torres died in the hands of the Ortega Police, as a political prisoner of the regime”, he asserted.
Baltodano recalled that Torres also fought against the Somocista dictatorship and now, he also did so, in a civic way against Ortega’s. “Hugo had to face two dictatorships, and he died in the second,” he said.
Belli: Vilified as “a criminal”
Gioconda Belli, another of the country’s great writers and currently in exile, also added on her Twitter account that General Torres was vilified and treated like a criminal.
Torres’s death was known more than two months after his whereabouts were unknown, while the dictatorship maintains a strong secrecy about the situation of the 170 political prisoners in Nicaragua.
“Hugo died of sadness and knowing that his entire heroic life was trampled by those for whom he risked his life so many times. Betrayals are the hardest cancer that a man of integrity and good like Hugo can suffer, ”he said.
Vilified and treated like a criminal, Hugo died of sadness and knowing that his entire heroic life was trampled on by those for whom he risked his life so many times. Betrayals are the hardest cancer that a man of integrity and good like Hugo can suffer. @ReporteNi https://t.co/U10AgMgcnF
— Gioconda Belli (@GiocondaBelliP) February 12, 2022
The Renovating Democratic Unity (Unamos) also lamented the death of its vice president and maintained that It was just one more crime committed by the dictatorship. “And that death, like all other murders, will not go unpunished. The example and consequence of Hugo rises beyond the perversity of the dictatorship”, they denounced.
In addition to Torres, the following UNAMOS leaders have been detained since last year: Víctor Hugo Tinoco, Suyén Barahona, Ana Margarita Vijil and Támara Dávila, who were arrested as part of the repressive escalation with which Ortega eliminated electoral competition before the voting last November, in which he was re-elected without legitimacy.
The example of Hugo Torres LIVE! pic.twitter.com/o6FfdnPVok
— Let’s unite (@unamosnica) February 12, 2022
The Blue and White National Unity (UNAB) denounced, for its part, that the “Ortega-Murillo dictatorship is solely responsible for what happened to Torres when he found himself under their guard and custody and subjected him to torture, extensive interrogations and the precarious conditions in which he was locked up during his months of arbitrary arrest.”
The relatives of the political prisoners have demanded the freedom of all and denounced that they are victims of torture and isolation in processes characterized by the lack of guarantees, which are in the hands of 15 judicial officials, including prosecutors, police officers and judges who execute the orders issued from El Carmen.
