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Nicaragua’s gold industry “is an important piece” that finances the government, which is why Washington has decided to sanction it in a new series of measures against the Managua regime that includes the prohibition of 500 Nicaraguans from entering the United States.
The target of the sanctions is the General Directorate of Mines (DGM), “an important gold operation controlled by the State,” according to Washington. The gold market moves about 1,000 million dollars each year and of these 750 million are exports to the United States.
“We are talking about gold today, but the new authorization allowed by the executive order allows other sectors of the Nicaraguan economy to be analyzed as long as they have the same impact of strengthening the authoritarian regime,” the US acting undersecretary for Affairs of the Americas, Ricardo Zúñiga.
With the sanctions, the United States wants to prevent the government of Ortega and his wife and Vice President Rosario Murillo from “using gold profits to oppress the Nicaraguan people,” he added.
More than 200 opponents have been imprisoned in Nicaragua since the 2018 demonstrations, which the government of Daniel Ortega linked to an alleged failed coup promoted by Washington.
Washington, which has already sanctioned dozens of officials and people close to Ortega, wants to put more pressure on the government, which has also closed more than 2,000 NGOs and attacked religious leaders and private universities.
With this objective, the US government has prohibited the entry into the country of more than 500 Nicaraguans, including members of the security services, judges, prosecutors, prison officials and higher education.
And it imposed economic sanctions on Lenín Cerna, former secretary of organization for the Sandinista Front, former director of State Security for the Sandinista revolutionary government (1979-1990) and for years one of the men in Ortega’s circle of trust.
As a result of the sanctions, all assets and interests in assets of both his and those related to the General Directorate of Mines that are in the United States or that are in the possession or control of Americans are blocked.
Joe Biden’s new measures come days after the European Union (EU) renewed its package of sanctions against the country for a year after a deterioration in relations.
