Human Rights Watch calls for sanctions against Nicaragua elite

A new report from the advocacy organisation Human Rights Watch (‘HRW’) documents human rights abuses which, it says, have been perpetrated by police and pro-government armed groups against opponents of the regime of Nicaragua’s president Daniel Ortega – since protests began in April 2018.

Since that time, says HRW, hundreds of people have been arrested or abducted, and many ‘subject to abuse that in some cases amounted to torture.’

The 98-page report concludes with recommendations that the international community impose sanctions against ‘senior government officials who bear responsibility for gross human rights violations’, amongst them:

• ‘President Daniel Ortega, who is supreme chief of the National Police and has sweeping powers, including to “command” the police at his will and dismiss police chiefs when they disobey his orders;
• Retired General Aminta Granera, former National Police chief until she was replaced by General Francisco Díaz in September 2018;
• General Francisco Díaz, the National Police chief, who is believed to have exercised significant control over the force first as deputy director and then later in his current position;
• General Ramon Avellán, the National Police deputy chief, the highest-ranking member of the National Police in Masaya, where police under his leadership together with armed pro-government gangs brutally repressed protesters,’

and several others.

See the report at:

https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/report_pdf/nicaragua0619_web.pdf