Within the framework of five years of political violence in Nicaragua, the Nicaraguan Human Rights Collective Nunca Más, the organization of Nicaraguan migrants in Mexico and the Oaxaca Consortium held the discussion “Forced displacement and Nicaraguan migration”.
Human rights defenders participated in the virtual event Wendy Flores, Francys Valdivia Machado and the lawyer bellanira lopezmembers of the aforementioned organizations.
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The speakers recalled that the forced migration of thousands of Nicaraguans originated from the social unrest in 2018, where the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo launched a wave of repression against all citizens who opposed it and questioned its authoritarianism.
Faced with this issue, human rights defender Francys Valdivia recalled that after five years of repression, Nicaraguan migration is the largest the country has experienced, surpassing those of the 1970s and 1980s, in a context of war.
Danger of migrants passing through Mexico
Regarding the different situations of migrants who leave in search of better life opportunities, Valdivia Machado highlighted the danger that many face when arriving or passing through Mexico, a transit country that they have to cross to reach the United States.
He explained that the last fiscal year in Mexico, which ended on September 30, 2022, was the “most deadly”, leaving a balance of more than 800 people deadwho tried to reach North American soil.
«Many of the citizens who died were due to exhaustion, heat or drowning. This represents an increase of 56 percent, compared to the previous record of 546 migrant deaths recorded in 2020,” said the human rights defender.
Another of the situations that the specialist pointed out was the gender-based violence faced by vulnerable groups, including girls, boys and people of sexual diversity.
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“These processes and conditions that migrants face have been documented and it is necessary to make them visible, and especially that of Nicaraguan migration that has remained in a sense of superficiality, where only the tragedies that have occurred in Mexico are mentioned, but there has been no follow-up,” he stressed.
Costa Rica, the country that has received the largest number of Nicaraguan migrants
For her part, lawyer Wendy Flores remarked that as a result of the repression that Nicaraguans are experiencing, Costa Rica is the first country of reception and refuge for the majority of Nicaraguans.
“Costa Rica opened the doors to the victims of repression, protected them and has received them in all these years, to the point that that country has more than 198,900 Nicaraguans displaced within the country,” he said.
As a result of the high number of migrants in the neighboring country to the south, Flores indicated that being a poor country, it cannot receive so much population, so it depends on international cooperation and thus cover basic needs.
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“Many migrants suffer a lot because Costa Rica is one of the most expensive countries in the region, therefore, when talking about the situation of migrants, it must be based on knowing the conditions in which Nicaraguans leave and the efforts they make host countries,” he emphasized.
After this growing migratory wave, the human rights defenders called on the countries that stand out the most in hosting migrants to continue solidarity and provide greater opportunities to people fleeing government repression.
