MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Nicaragua releases over 200 political prisoners, sends them to the US

“Let them have their mercenaries,” Ortega said on TV about those released

The Nicaraguan government of President Daniel Ortega has released over 200 political prisoners and sent them over to the United States, it was reported in Managua. The beneficiaries of the move, including opposition leaders, priests, and critics of the government, were transferred to the El Chipote prison late Wednesday and boarded a plane in the early hours of Thursday, according to journalist Tifani Roberts, who currently resides in the United States.

“Let them have their mercenaries,” Ortega said on TV about those released.

Amnesty International (AI) Director for the Americas Erika Guevara Rosas celebrated these releases, although they meant sending these people “into exile.”

“They were imprisoned for defending Human Rights and raising their voices against a ruthless regime,” Guevara Rosas said on Twitter.

Those sent back to the US amounted to 222 people who were also stripped of their Nicaraguan citizenship after a Constitutional amendment allowing for such a measure was passed in one day. “We have ordered the loss of Nicaraguan nationality to 222 people who were declared traitors to the homeland,” a Managua Court of Appeals ruled.

The decision adopted Friday was based on the “Special Law that regulates the loss of Nicaraguan nationality” approved the day before and published swiftly in the Official Gazette.

”Hence, the loss of the nationality of 222 persons who betrayed the homeland was in strict compliance with Law 1145 (Special Law regulating the loss of Nicaraguan nationality), which we will continue to apply in full force,” the Court of Appeals stated in its ruling.

The National Assembly of Nicaragua (Parliament) approved in its first legislature a reform to the Constitution to strip the nationality of Nicaraguans sentenced for crimes considered “treason to the homeland.” The new amendment provides for “the acquisition, loss, and recovery of [Nicaraguan] nationality” and “traitors to the homeland lose the quality of Nicaraguan nationality.”

More specifically, those “sentenced under the provisions of the Law for the Defense of the Rights of the People to Independence, Sovereignty and Self-Determination for Peace, published on December 22, 2020, shall lose Nicaraguan nationality.”

The norm is to be exercised by the Judiciary, which shall notify the Supreme Electoral Council whenever such a measure is taken.

Among the 222 prisoners, there were 7 who tried to challenge Ortega in the last elections but were disenfranchised for life.

In the meantime, Spain has offered citizenship to those encompassed by the new measures, Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares told reporters Friday. The Spanish government made its decision to offer the former prisoners citizenship following “reports that proceedings had begun to declare them stateless.” The prisoners have been allowed to enter the US on temporary humanitarian visas. Spanish authorities said they would reach out to the prisoners to invite them to formally apply for citizenship, Al Jazeera reported.

In a statement on Thursday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken welcomed the release as a step “towards addressing human rights abuses” in Nicaragua and said it was the result of “concerted American diplomacy.”

Nicaragua has been going through a political and social crisis since April 2018, which was accentuated after the controversial general elections of November 7, 2021, in which Ortega was reelected for a fifth term, fourth consecutive, and second together with his wife, Rosario Murillo, as vice president, with his main contenders in prison or in exile.