Five leaders of the Unión Democrática Renovadora (Unamos) accumulate this Saturday, April 9, 300 days imprisoned in the Evaristo Vásquez Police Complex of the Directorate of Judicial Assistance, known as “El Nuevo Chipote”, a center where they receive -according to complaints from their relatives – cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
On June 13, the guerrilla commander Dora María Téllez; the former president of Unamos, Ana Margarita Vijil; the former Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Víctor Hugo Tinoco; retired general Hugo Torres Jiménez; and the president of Unamos, Suyen Barahona. Tamara Dávila was arrested a day earlier, on June 12, 2021.
The dictatorship subjected them to political trials where they were found guilty of the alleged crime of “conspiracy to undermine national integrity.” Tinoco was sentenced to 13 years in prison; Ana Margarita Vijil was sentenced to 10 years in prison and Tamara Dávila, Dora María Téllez and Suyen Barahona 8 years each.
Tamara Dávila is also a member of the Political Council of the Blue and White National Unity (UNAB). She was imprisoned the night of June 12, they raided her home where she was with her daughter.
The next day, June 13, the sanctioned Police arbitrarily raided the home of former Sandinista guerrilla Dora María Téllez and arrested her along with Ana Margarita Vijil. About three hours before the raid, at least two police and motorized patrols surrounded the ex-combatant’s home, while a drone flew over the property.
Before being detained, Vijil left a recorded message stating that “this video would come out in case I was illegally detained. I want to leave it said, what we have already said at other times: we continue in the fight, this is part of the process to get rid of Daniel Ortega. No one here cracks Daniel Ortega is leaving! We’re going to take it out. Forces”.
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Hours later, the president of Unamos, Suyen Barahona, was arrested at her home in Managua. “These actions against the leadership of Unamos are part of the repressive escalation of Ortega, against the entire democratic opposition,” denounced the directive of that political group.
“I call on you to maintain hope, to maintain the mobilization, for the indignation to turn into action and for us to achieve the freedom of Nicaragua. May another generation never again suffer the horrors we have had to endure! We are the majority. Together we can achieve change », the leader said in a recorded message before her arrest.
Around 9:00 at night, Víctor Hugo Tinoco was kidnapped by civilians who were traveling in a Hilux truck, in the vicinity of Galerías Santo Domingo, municipality of Managua. Hours before, at around six in the afternoon, his family warned that a police patrol was holding him, but they let him go; however, the regime’s operators carried out his intention some time later.
A few hours later, Hugo Torres Jiménez was also arrested, who died after 244 days in detention and for whom there is no official version of his death. International, political and human rights organizations have demanded an exhaustive investigation to find out the conditions of his death.
To the leaders of Unamos, now political prisoners, was accused of violating Law 1055 for allegedly “undermining the sovereignty of Nicaragua” and for “inciting foreign interference in internal affairs and requesting military interventions,” the Police reported in various press releases. Like the rest of opponents who have been imprisoned under the so-called “Sovereignty Law.”
Unamos is a political organization, formerly the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS), made up of dissidents from the ruling Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) party who became strong critics of the dictator and former comrade, Daniel Ortega.
Among its founders are Dora María Téllez, guerrilla commander and Minister of Health in the 1980s; Víctor Hugo Tinoco, also a former guerrilla and former deputy foreign minister; and the guerrilla commander and retired Army brigadier general, Hugo Torres Jiménez; all of them imprisoned and the last one died in captivity by his former revolutionary companion.
