The authoritarian government of Nicaragua surprised everyone yesterday by releasing 222 political prisoners, almost all of whom it had imprisoned, although it immediately exiled them to the US. Sandinista President Daniel Ortega's motives for ordering the mass release are a mystery, although opposition organizations point out that the regime is suffocated by the sanctions imposed by the White House.
Despite the fact that Washington assures that the decision was made unilaterally by Ortega, it is evident that there had to be some negotiation with the US government, which accepted the arrival of a private plane that flew from Managua with the 222 released prisoners. In this sense, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, affirmed yesterday that these releases "open the door to dialogue between the United States and Nicaragua". In a statement, Blinken added that it is "a constructive step to confront the abuses of human rights in the country.
The Secretary of State acknowledged that the releases are "the product of US diplomacy" and confirmed that the US "facilitated safe transportation to Dulles International Airport," guaranteeing all of them medical and legal support.
The 222 released represent almost all of those imprisoned after the 2018 citizen revolt, when thousands of Nicaraguans took to the streets to demand the departure of Ortega and his wife and vice president Rosario Murillo, although opponents who were wearing a decade in prison. According to a report by the organization Mechanism for the Recognition of Political Prisoners of Nicaragua, the number of those imprisoned for ideological reasons at the end of November of last year was 235. Based on that figure, only thirteen political prisoners would remain in prison.
The measure of the regime was formalized through the ruling of the president of Chamber One of the Court of Appeals of Managua, Octavio Rothschuh, who described the expulsion of citizens from their own country as “deportation”. Rothschuh ordered the "immediate and already effective deportation of 222 people sentenced for committing acts that undermine the independence, sovereignty and self-determination of the people, for inciting violence, terrorism and economic destabilization".
Simultaneously, the National Assembly, co-opted by the Sandinistas, approved a reform of the Constitution to modify the article that regulates the nationality of Nicaraguans, classifying the exiles as "traitors to the homeland" and declaring them stateless.
Among those released is Lesther Alemán, a student leader who in 2018, during the televised inaugural meeting of the frustrated dialogue table between the government and the opponents, rebuked Ortega and demanded his resignation.
