During the 57th session of the Human Rights Council, experts point to a systematic deterioration of human rights in Nicaragua.
HAVANA TIMES – Human rights violations in Nicaragua have evolved systematically since 2018. The concentration of power by Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo continues to increase, and repression now has cross-border reach.
These are some of the points made during the 57th session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, in which the Group of Experts on Human Rights on Nicaragua (GHREN) participated.
The expert Group stressed that Nicaragua “does not meet even the most minimal reasonable standard of judicial independence” as power becomes increasingly concentrated in the dictatorial couple.
“We have identified at least 66 individuals in the middle and upper echelons of the organized power structure that is under the control of Nicaragua’s two rulers,” said the GHREN’s chairman, German-born Jan-Michael Simon, in his presentation of the Group’s report on Nicaragua to the Human Rights Council.
In the report, the German lawyer and fellow GHREN member, Uruguayan human rights expert Ariela Peralta, indicated that this power structure continues to facilitate, coordinate and carry out serious human rights violations and abuses.
Simon explained that crimes against humanity continue in Nicaragua. He pointed particularly to politically motivated persecution, arbitrary arrests, torture and mistreatment, as well as the instrumentalization of criminal law to eliminate any real, potential or perceived opposition.
“Victims are forced to choose between prison and leaving the country. A very recent example of this is the departure from the country of 135 people for political reasons,” Simon recalled, alluding to the recent banishment of political prisoners to Guatemala.
Repression in Nicaragua “with cross-border reach”
Even outside Nicaragua, the Ortega regime commits human rights violations with “cross-border reach” by denying the return to the country of many opponents, said the UN expert, who put the number of victims of these abuses abroad at more than 700.
Relatives of opponents, including at least a hundred children, are victimized solely because of their family ties, Simon pointed out, before also recalling the repression of civil society organizations and institutions, including the Catholic Church.
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