members of the group 222 former political prisoners who were expelled Recently from Nicaragua and received in Washington, they continue to exchange with the authorities of the United States, a country that gave them shelter after their nationality was withdrawn upon their release.
This Wednesday, the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Samantha Power, met four of them: the former presidential candidates Félix Maradiaga and Juan Sebastián Chamorro, the peasant leader Medardo Mairena and the activist Pedro Mena.
“The activists and their wives thanked the US government on behalf of all those released for facilitating their release and for their support after they arrived in the United States,” USAID spokeswoman Jessica Jennings said in a statement.
Likewise, the opponents would have expressed “their gratitude” for the “continued support” of the US government for their cause, and for “their efforts to defend human rights and return democracy to Nicaragua.”
Also on Wednesday, another group of Nicaraguan expatriates held a meeting with Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine-Cava and Doral City Councilwoman Maureen Porras.
Receiving them in Miami, Florida, Levine-Cava stated: “Events like this remind us of how important the redesignation of Temporary Protected Status is to protect Nicaraguans who have had to flee their country in search of freedom, to save their lives. and his family”.
Last Thursday, February 9, the government of Daniel Ortega released -but forced to leave the country– 222 people who remained imprisoned for political reasons, a negotiation that included the participation of the United States as the receiving country.
expatriates they arrived in washington, the US capital, and the State Department reported their temporary location in hotels while their immigration processes were completed, in accordance with established laws. they all went accepted under humanitarian parole.
However, the Nicaraguan bishop Rolando José Álvarez, a strong critic of the government of Daniel Ortega, refused to leave the country and a day later he was sentenced to 26 years and 4 months in prison and stripped of his nationalityjudicial sources reported.
Ortega assured the Nicaraguan media that his government made no demands to the US to expel the opponents.
The deputy assistant secretary of the Office of Western Hemisphere Affairs of the US Department of State, Emily Mendrala, reported shortly after that Washington would take care of making possible the relocation of the new arrivals, both inside and outside US territory, where they have family.
The Spanish government, through its foreign ministry, announced the offer of grant nationality to these Nicaraguanswhose government stripped them of it.
Some of those who arrived in Miami expressed concern about the situation of their relatives who were left behind on Nicaraguan soil.
“The biggest concern for us as mothers… I have two children and a husband and they are being heavily persecuted,” she told the voice of america Maria Jose Martinez.
Víctor Manuel Sosa Herrera was just as emphatic. “Our family is imprisoned, it is being besieged, in my case, the police, the genocidal guard constantly arrive in the morning to besiege my house,” he told the VOA.
Tell his story
This Friday, February 16, the voice of americaat its headquarters in Washington, will offer a discussion at 1:00 pm, local time, with some of the ex-Nicaraguan political prisoners who arrived last week.
The guests will talk about their personal cases, the experiences they left behind in their native Nicaragua and their expectations for the future.
It is expected that Juan Lorenzo Holmann Chamorro, general manager of the newspaper La Prensa, Samantha Padilla Jirón, a journalism student, and Mairena himself, the peasant leader, will participate.
Councilor Maureen Porras, from Miami, wanted to have an express solidarity gesture towards those who remained in Nicaragua. “We continue to pray for the well-being and protection of the political prisoners who are still detained and we join the many calls for their release.”
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