The feminist organization Católicas por el Derecho a Decidir denounces that in these first months of 2023, 16 Nicaraguan women have been registered as victims of sexist violence inside and outside the country. This situation leaves 15 minors orphans.
In the list of female victims, they register the ages of 18 to 59 years; four of them murdered by their partners, three by their husbands, five by unknown subjects and two known. Eight of the cases occurred within Nicaragua and the rest were registered abroad, mainly Costa Rica and the United States.
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In addition, most of the unpunished cases are found abroad where four of the victims have not obtained justice and another four are in legal proceedings. For their part, in Nicaragua they register two cases in impunity and three that continue to be prosecuted.
“There have been 16 femicides in the first three months of the year, leaving Nicaraguan families in mourning (…) That is why we say that femicide is worse than the pandemic (of COVID-19), because with the pandemic measures are taken to prevent , but in femicide no measures are taken or campaigns are carried out to reduce the macho culture of the aggressors in the face of women’s lives,” said a human rights defender.
Faced with this wave of femicide, the source recommended that women victims of violence report and be alert to any signs of aggression. “That they seek help from a close relative, whether it is a woman or a defender who exists in each territory in Nicaragua, because they are not alone,” she remarked.
In addition, he called on the Nicaraguan government to pay more attention to cases of violence against women, because “the opening of the police stations are not giving us favorable results because what we need is not structures, but rather that they have specialized personnel.” and that they comply in accordance with Law 779 to follow up on all women, because the main objective of the law is to protect the lives of women,” the source stressed.
According to data from Catholics for the Right to Decide, more than 50 women were murdered in 2022, at least 71 women died from gender violence in Nicaragua in 2021 and a similar number in 2020.
