The Government, Justice and the National Assembly (AN, Parliament) of Nicaragua joined this Thursday in a lightning operation to free and deport 222 political prisoners, among them religious, former presidential candidates, diplomats and leaders with a past of high positions in Sandinismo, strip them of their nationality, permanently disqualify them from holding public office and send them to the United States .
The scheme, meticulously organized, implied a judicial decision, a simultaneous express reform of the local Constitution and an agreement with Washington, evidently woven with some anticipation, so that it would accept to receive the now express members.
The scheme, meticulously organized, implied a judicial decision, a simultaneous express reform of the local Constitution and an agreement with Washington, evidently woven with some anticipation, so that it would accept to receive the now express members.
The dimension of the operation can be measured by the total number of prisoners considered political: the Mechanism for the Recognition of Political Prisoners included 245 people on its list last month, and the opposition site 100% Noticias de Managua reported that they are now in the prisons of the country 39 inmates with that qualification.
“The immediate and already effective deportation of 222 people is ordered. These people have already been deported from the country, for which the respective letters were issued,” declared Judge Octavio Rothschuh, president of Chamber One of the Court of Appeals of Managua.
The magistrate added that they were all deprived of their political rights in perpetuity, “declared traitors to the country and punished for different serious crimes and permanently disqualified from exercising public office, as well as holding positions of popular election, their citizen rights being suspended.” perpetually.”
From Washington, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, welcomed the news and assured that the decision “opens the door to dialogue.”
“The release of these individuals, one of whom is a United States citizen, marks a constructive step to address human rights abuses in the country and opens the door for more dialogue between the United States and Nicaragua on issues of concern,” Blinken said in a statement.
The text clarifies that although it was a “unilateral” decision by Nicaragua, “it is positive and welcome” and remarks: “we remain firm in encouraging additional steps” by the Ortega government to “restore civil liberties and democracy for the people Nicaraguan”.
Those released arrived at Dulles airport in Virginia, near Washington, In a plane “facilitated” by the United States, they were later transferred to hotels and will be able to stay in the United States for two years.
Among the 222 released are the brothers Cristiana and Pedro Joaquín Chamorro, and their cousin, Juan Sebastián Chamorro, as well as former presidential candidates Arturo Cruz and Félix Maradiaga, and the former manager of El Nuevo Diario Arnulfo Somarriba.
Six priests also appear, but not the Bishop of Matagalpa, Rolando Álvarez Lagos, the highest authority of the imprisoned Church, refused to board the plane, as confirmed hours later by Daniel Ortega.
“Álvarez did not want to abide by what the law mandates, what the State of Nicaragua mandates”added the ruler about the bishop’s decision to reject the expulsion order from the country, said the president in statements to Nicaraguan TV.
Ortega also denied that the massive release was the result of a “negotiation” with the United States, which has imposed sanctions on Managua for the repression after the 2018 anti-government protests.
On the other hand, the peasant leader Medardo Mairena, the former Sandinista guerrilla leaders Dora María Téllez and Víctor Hugo Tinoco did leave; businessmen Juan Lorenzo Jerónimo Holmann Chamorro, Michael Healy Lacayo and Álvaro Vargas Duarte; the student leaders Max Jerez and Lesther Alemán; and the journalists Miguel Mora Barberena and Miguel Mendoza.
The former first lady María Fernanda Flores (wife of former President Arnoldo Alemán), former Foreign Minister Francisco Aguirre, former Ambassador Arturo Cruz and former Vice Foreign Minister José Pallais appear on the list of prisoners already in the United States.
They were all part of the hundreds of opponents detained in Nicaragua in the context of the repression that followed the protests that broke out in 2018 against Ortega, in power since 2007 and successively reelected in contested elections.
Several of them were accused and sentenced for violating the so-called Law for the Defense of the Rights of the People to Independence, Sovereignty and Self-determination for Peace, of just two articles.
The exile operation demanded from the AN a reform of article 21 of the local Constitution, approved by 89 votes out of 91, which now has this addition: “Traitors to the homeland lose their status as Nicaraguan nationals.”
Immediately afterwards, the Assembly approved a Special Law Regulating the Loss of Nicaraguan Nationality to regulate the provisions of the new article 21.
“We are proud to receive them in the United States. It is a positive and constructive step by the Nicaraguan government, but it is not a panacea for the concerns we have about Nicaragua,” said later, after confirming the arrival of the express, the spokesman for US diplomacy, Ned Price.
As explained by the official, the Department of State organized the reception of the prisoners “so that they stay in hotels during their first term with the help of NGOs.”
Earlier, the news had begun to circulate on social networks, and was celebrated by exiled Nicaraguans and NGOs.
“Some 222 political prisoners come to the city of Washington, they were released”Arturo McFields, Ortega’s former ambassador to the OAS, said in a video on social networks, dismissed after describing his country as a “dictatorship” and now residing in the United States.
The writer Sergio Ramírez, who was Ortega’s vice president in his first term (1985-1990), and is now in exile in Spain, expressed his satisfaction with the release of the prisoners: “Today is a great day for the fight for the freedom of Nicaragua, when so many unjustly convicted or prosecuted prisoners leave prisons, go into exile, but go to freedom,” Ramírez tweeted.
The director of Amnesty International for the Americas, Erika Guevara, also said on Twitter that relatives of prisoners had confirmed their release, but gave no further details.
France also celebrated the liberationsamong other reasons because they benefited two compatriots Jeannine Horvilleur and Ana Álvarez Horvilleur, wife and daughter of Javier Álvarez, a retired economist who was a Sandinista militant until the mid-1990s.
Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna considered that this is a “first step” towards the return of the rule of law in the country, and thanked the US for its “commitment in favor of this positive outcome.”
Some NGOs dedicated to human rights warned that the banishment applied to the 222 released constitutes “a crime against humanity.” contemplated in the so-called Rome Statute, which establishes it as one of the 11 behaviors that are part of any generalized or systematic attack against a civilian population, but Nicaragua is not a signatory to that global agreement.
