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Washington (AFP) – Relatives of opponents imprisoned in Nicaragua in “heartbreaking” conditions on Thursday implored the heads of state in contact with President Daniel Ortega to intercede to “save lives” because “there is no time to lose.”
“Those governments that have dialogue with the Ortega regime, that meet to talk about the economy, trade, the (Central American Integration System) SICA, for example, that also meet to talk and intercede for political prisoners,” Berta Valle, wife of Félix Maradiaga, cried out at a virtual press conference.
“How is it possible that this cruelty that political prisoners are experiencing is left aside? Human rights must be at the center of all economic policy,” added Valle, whose husband began a hunger strike on June 21 to demand the end of incommunicado detention.
According to the group Mechanism for the Recognition of Political Prisoners, there are 182 detainees in Nicaragua, of whom 46 were arrested last year, including seven former presidential candidates who intended to compete against Ortega in the November elections.
After ruling the country until 1990, Ortega returned to power in 2007 and in November won a fourth consecutive term, with most of his detractors and rivals imprisoned or exiled.
One of them was the candidate Juan Sebastián Chamorro.
His wife, Victoria Cárdenas, asks the international community for “desperate and urgent” help to “save lives,” “for these innocent people who could die at any moment.”
He is referring to Hugo Torres, a former comrade-in-arms and later critic of Ortega who died in a hospital after spending months in Managua’s El Chipote prison.
Countries like Mexico, Honduras or Argentina, “which still interact” with Ortega, must “prioritize on their agendas” the release of political prisoners, said Juan Pappier, a researcher at the NGO Human Rights Watch.
And “we must increase the pressure against the regime” by working “with the multilateral financing organizations” that give it money, he points out.
The situation of the political prisoners is “heartbreaking”, according to Berta Valle, who stresses “that there is no time to waste here”.
punishment cell
According to Jared Genser, a lawyer for Chamorro and Maradiaga, the conditions of the prisoners, in general, are terrible, with a lack of food that has made some lose more than 25 kilos, limited or no access to medical attention and incommunicado regime. .
In addition, some are locked in cells with lights on night and day or completely in the dark, they are not allowed to communicate with their loved ones abroad and lack access to reading, including the Bible, he details.
“In my case I am exiled and my daughter and I have not been allowed a phone call in almost 400 days or a letter,” Victoria Cárdenas complains.
Her husband has been visited by other relatives on a few occasions. From her testimony a graphic designer has made a portrait of him.
“When I see this image, I have in my mind the tears on my daughter’s face when trying to figure out if this could be her father today. It is not the Juan that I have known,” he says, showing it. In the portrait he looks very emaciated.
Renata Holmann says that her mother and sister have been able to visit her father Juan Lorenzo Holmann, who has been in a tiny “punishment cell” since January, without ventilation, with little light and mold on the walls.
He told them that to “exercise his mind, he reads the labels of the drinks they bring him over and over again.”
For Renata, the objective of these deals is “to create a state of terror” so that the rest of Nicaraguans “don’t feel safe raising their voices and continuing the fight for a free and democratic Nicaragua.”
Of the imprisoned opponents, at least 45 have been sentenced to up to 13 years in prison for “undermining national integrity” and other crimes. Ortega accuses them of attacking the stability of the country with the support of the United States.
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