The Nicaraguan dictatorship has committed and continues to commit “crimes against humanity” against students, teachers, academic directors and other university personnel, opponents or perceived as such, and the main criminals against humanity are the dictator Daniel Ortega and the vice-dictator. Rosario Murillo, says the United Nations (UN)
In its most recent report on the situation in Nicaragua, the UN Group of Human Rights Experts (GHREN) determined that, as of 2018, after the start of social protests that demanded the end of the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship, in which university students played a leading role, the Nicaraguan regime premeditatedly and systematically attacked the higher education subsystem in order to subjugate it, disappear university autonomy and get rid of the students who participated in the protests.
With that objective, says the GHREN report, the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship committed “serious violations and abuses of international human rights law against students, teachers, academic directors and other university or higher education institution personnel who participated in the 2018 protests and/or have been critical of the Government or considered as such.
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The document released this week maintains that the violations and abuses committed by the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship “are part of a broader attack by the Government against universities and their autonomy, which reflects its intention to control any space that allows criticism.” and lead resistance, protest or dissidence autonomously”, and therefore, the Nicaraguan regime “has eliminated university autonomy and academic freedom.”
Crimes against humanity
The extensive GHREN report indicates that, after a thorough investigation, it found reasonable grounds to conclude that, since April 2018, various State actors and institutions, following orders issued by the Presidency and the Vice Presidency, had been perpetrating serious human rights violations. and that these violations are consistent “prima facie” with the elements that constitute “crimes against humanity.”
Likewise, UN experts point out that, after the investigation continued up to the present, they have confirmed that these crimes have not stopped, but rather “have continued to be perpetuated, affecting a growing number of victims.”
In this sense, the UN investigators point out that they have reasonable grounds to conclude that “the group made up of students, teachers, academic managers and other university personnel who organized themselves around the defense of human rights and participated in the protests of 2018 and/or have expressed positions or opinions different from the Government’s line, are part of the opposition Nicaraguan population or perceived as such (victim of crimes against humanity at the hands of the dictatorship).
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The GHREN identifies, among the crimes against humanity committed in Nicaragua against the university sector, “murder, imprisonment, torture, deportation and persecution for political reasons.”
Likewise, they warn that, “the Group has received information about possible violations and abuses of the human rights of students and teachers at other levels of education (primary and secondary), which requires a complementary investigation.”
Ortega and Murillo, main criminals against humanity
The report of the Group of Experts specifies that it “continued to document how the President and Vice President used various State entities to commit the human rights violations and abuses and crimes described in this document.”
In that sense, they make it clear that the orders to commit the documented crimes come from the offices of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo. But they also point out as executors the Public Ministry, the Ministry of the Interior (formerly the Interior), the National Police, the National Council of Universities (CNU), the Accreditation Council and the National Assembly.
The GHREN has already presented other reports in which it also points out the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship as the perpetrator of crimes against humanity against the population in general, but also against indigenous populations and against the church.
