The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention calls on the Government of Nicaragua to “immediately release” the political prisoners Cristiana Chamorro Barrios and the former employees of the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation: Walter Gómez, Marcos Fletes and Pedro Vásquez. In addition, he demanded to carry out an “exhaustive and independent investigation” of the circumstances surrounding his “arbitrary deprivation” of liberty and to adopt the pertinent measures against those responsible for the violation of his rights.
In opinion 58/2022 regarding Cristiana María Chamorro Barrios et al., the UN Working Group also requests that the four political prisoners be granted the effective right to obtain a compensation and other types of reparation, in accordance with international law. It is a report from December 2022, which circulates until this second week of January.
In the document, the group explains that the deprivation of liberty is of an “arbitrary nature” because it contravenes eight articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and nine articles of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Nicaragua is a signatory.
They indicate that there is no legal basis that justifies the arrest and trial carried out against these four people, since paradoxically both processes are the result of the exercise of the rights to freedom of opinion, expression and political participation.
“It is evident that the detention was carried out to make it impossible for the four detainees, members of political groups opposed to the Government, to express their opinions, carry out their work and participate in the public life of the country,” the document mentions.
?? From CENIDH we share opinion 58/2022 of the GTDA: “The deprivation of Cristiana Chamorro, Marcos Fletes, Walter Gómez and Pedro Vásquez are arbitrary.” We demand that they be released immediately and the +230 political prisoners who have also been arbitrarily detained. https://t.co/FRksKaYVDs
— Cenidh (@cenidh) January 12, 2023
Due to all of the above, the Working Group considers that “the guarantees of the four people to a fair trial provided for in Articles 9 and 10 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as in Articles 9 and 14, were seriously violated. of the Pact, for which reason the detention is considered arbitrary according to the category.”
Regime ignores all recommendations of the UN Group
At the end of June 2022, the Workgroup called for the immediate release of political prisoners Arturo Cruz Sequeira, Violeta Granera, José Adán Aguerri, José Pallais, Tamara Dávila, Ana Margarita Vijil, Dora María Téllez, Suyen Barahona, Víctor Hugo Tinoco, Luis Rivas, Miguel Mora, Miguel Mendoza and Pedro Joaquin Chamorro Barrios; but the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo ignored his recommendations.
On that occasion, the Group also demanded a specific investigation into the case of retired general Hugo Torres, who died in police custody on February 12, 2022, and that it include a detailed report from an independent expert on medical care and other guy you received.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) has also unsuccessfully demanded the release of political prisoners in Nicaragua, in order to “protect and guarantee their right to life”, for which in November 2022 it declared the State of Nicaragua in “permanent contempt” and warned that it will raise the situation to the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS).
Currently, the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo maintains 235 political prisoners in the different jails of the country and, as he expressed this week, in his first speech of 2023during the installation of the new legislative period, has no intention of acquitting them despite the “campaigns” for their release.
Ortega assured that “not even with life imprisonment” could they pay off the damage that, according to him, they caused Nicaragua during the massive protests of 2018, which he again described as an “attempted coup” to which he added the description of “bloody ”.
