The UN warned on Tuesday of a “serious” deterioration in human rights in Nicaragua since last year, with an increase in arbitrary arrests, mistreatment and persecution of all those “perceived as dissidents” by the government of Daniel Ortega.
“Authorities continue to persecute not only those who express dissenting opinions, but also any person or organization acting independently or not directly under their control,” the report said in a statement released by the agency’s Human Rights Office.
“This includes human rights defenders, independent media, non-governmental organizations and any other entity advocating for social or political change without government oversight,” it added.
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The report, based on 120 interviews with victims and witnesses of human rights violations and civil society representatives, covers a one-year period since June last year.
Among other facts, the text points out that in May of this year “131 people considered to be opponents were found under arbitrary detention,” a figure much higher than that of June 2023.
It also documents 12 cases of “torture and ill-treatment in detention” as well as an increase in violence against indigenous and Afro-descendant people.
The report warns that religious freedom in the Central American country “continued to be subject to undue restrictions,” including the “arbitrary” detention of 27 Catholic priests and seminarians between October and January, and the closure of many religious organizations among the 5,000 organizations of all kinds that have been dissolved since 2018.
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The government of Ortega and his powerful wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, put up with anti-NGO laws after the 2018 protests, which left more than 300 dead in three months, according to UN reports.
Ortega, a 78-year-old former guerrilla who ruled Nicaragua in the 1980s and returned to power without interruption since 2007, maintains that NGOs and especially the Catholic Church support these protests, which he considers an attempted coup sponsored by Washington.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said that the exercise of fundamental civil and political rights is becoming increasingly difficult.
“The multifaceted crisis that has affected Nicaragua since 2018 requires an urgent change of course by the Government,” he said.
At the end of August, Tusk said that “unfortunately” there is no “cooperation” between the Ortega government and his office, which “makes it very difficult” to monitor the situation in the country.
