After the cancellation of the legal personality of 101 non-profit organizations, including to Missionaries of Charity Associationthe condemnation and repudiation against the Ortega regime has been evidenced through statements by national and international organizations.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) expressed through its official Twitter account that in “Nicaragua the cancellation of a civil society organization and the elimination of confessional TV channels continues,” in relation to the censorship of the Catholic Channel San José, owned by the Diocese of Estelí, TV Merced and the Catholic Channel, of the Episcopal Conference of Nicaragua.
He also criticized that the censorship by the Ortega dictatorship “is one of the most extreme undue restrictions of the #Freedom of expression; not only does it not hide, but on the contrary, it further exposes the serious situation of #HR».
For his part, the former ambassador of the Organization of American States (OAS) Arthur McFields He said that the new action of the Nicaraguan regime is another attack and cruelty against the Catholic Church and NGOs.
«The dictatorship in Nicaragua intensifies a campaign of hatred against the Catholic Church: they have perforated the temples with bullets, they have imprisoned a priest, censored 2 television channels; now they expel the Missionary Sisters of Charity of Teresa of Calcutta. 190 attacks and the list keeps growing,” she wrote.
Father Harving Padilla: “This is a direct attack on the needs of the people”
For his part, Father Harving Padilla, who was in charge of the San Juan Bautista de Masaya parish, told Article 66 that the situation that Nicaragua is experiencing with the closure of the Missionaries of Charity Association is unfortunate, because the Ortega dictatorship is taking away the opportunity to support people in need “and that they receive the blessing that the Church offers.”
Related news: Ortega regime eliminates the Missionaries of Charity Association and 100 more NGOs
The priest stressed that this new attack by the Nicaraguan government is “a direct attack on the needs of the people, it is an attack on all Nicaraguans who benefit from charity and thus be able to survive in the midst of so much poverty that is being experienced in our Nicaraguan homeland.
“Yes, it is an attack on the Catholic Church of Nicaragua, but more than the Church it is against the poor, the marginalized, because although it is true, the sisters of charity came out of the country well, but the work of they are not going to stop because they left Nicaragua; the work goes together with them to other places where they will be welcomed and will find people in need of a helping hand, “said the prelate.
He emphasized that Ortega is closing the opportunity to help people in need, giving them a space “within society that is the dignity of the human being.”
Regarding the censorship of the San José Catholic Channel, Padilla said that by removing a religious media outlet, “the religious people who could receive the word of God are being removed.”
“Believing —the regime— that evil is being done to a single target, they are doing it to an entire people,” concluded Father Harving Padilla, who expressed his solidarity with the Diocese of Estelí. “There will be other means where the Church will continue its evangelization and announcing the message of our Lord Jesus Christ,” he stressed.
With the closure of these 101 nonprofit organizations, the dictatorship has “annihilated” more than 750 NGOs, using as an excuse that they did not meet the requirements that it has demanded through the new invented laws.
