‘Rights crisis’: Amnesty report documents abuses in Nicaragua

The government of President Daniel Ortega has been criticized for attacking dissidents and consolidating power.

The human rights organization Amnesty International has warned that the government of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo is deepening repression in the Central American state.

In a report released Tuesday, the organization said the government has involved in abuse such as arbitrary detention, torture and the deprivation of citizenship of dissidents.

“We have shown the continuum of repression to which Nicaraguan society has been subjected and the different patterns of human rights violations inflicted on people who dare to speak out,” Erika Guevara-Rosas, director for the Amnesty International Americas. Press release.

The Ortega government has been accused of consolidating power and suppressing opposition voices since April 2018, when anti-austerity protests against cuts to social security benefits were met with a heavy hand. government response in which hundreds of people were killed and detained.

Our report explains the main tactics – excessive use of force, use of criminal laws to unfairly criminalize dissidents, attacks on civil society and forced exile – that the government has used to silence any critical voice.

Out now 👇 https://t.co/ww6NOH5ahc

— Amnesty International (@amnesty) April 18, 2023

The report says the government has continued to “expand and reinvent” such patterns of repression through a variety of methods, including excessive force, attacks on civil society groups, and the use of the judiciary to target opponents.

Kai Thaler, a professor of global studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara, told Al Jazeera that the repression in Nicaragua has contributed to a regional trend of diminishing democratic freedoms that has also affected neighboring countries such as The Savior and Guatemala.

“Ortega and Murillo’s ability to consolidate an authoritarian regime and retain power despite brutal repression and international pressure can only reassure other leaders that they can continue to dismantle democratic institutions or persecute opponents with little fear.” Thaler said in response to written questions.

In its report on Tuesday, Amnesty said the Ortega government has “co-opted” the judicial system, going after “unfair trials of people simply because they were seen as critical of the government.”

In February, a Nicaraguan court revoked citizenship of 94 exiled dissidents in a move that was declared illegal by the United Nations refugee agency.

“International law prohibits the arbitrary deprivation of nationality, including on racial, ethnic, religious or political grounds,” the agency said in a press release at the time.

That decision came shortly after the government had expelled 222 political prisoners, sending them to the United States and forcing them into exile.

Civil society organizationsHuman rights activists and independent media have also suffered harassment, loss of legal status and raids by police forces, the report notes.

In a statement on Tuesday, Nicaragua announced that it was revoking its approval of the European Union ambassador to the country after the body criticized the rule of law under the Ortega administration.

Ortega first ascended to the presidency in 2007, but has been a central figure in Nicaraguan politics for decades. He was a leader of the left-wing Sandinista rebel group, which overthrew the US-backed Somoza dictatorship in 1979.

However, Ortega is now accused of many of the same crimes committed by Somoza: torture, forced disappearances and the elimination of political rivals.

Last year, a former Sandinista leader and presidential hopeful named Hugo Torres died in prison at the age of 73 after being arrested along with several opposition politicians.

In their early days as rebels fighting the Somoza government, Torres once led a daring raid to free Ortega from prison.