The United States government on Tuesday prohibited the entry into the country of members of the Nicaraguan government “headed by President Daniel Ortega and his spouse and Vice President Rosario Murillo”, considering that their actions “undermine or damage democratic institutions or impede the return to democracy ”in the Central American country.
The provision is contained in a statement signed by President Joe Biden, in which he lashed out at “the repression of the Ortega government against opposition leaders, civil society leaders and journalists” prior to the presidential and legislative elections of July 7. last November.
“The repressive and abusive acts of the Ortega government and those who support him force the United States to act,” Biden said in the document, after indicating that he takes these measures in view of “the importance for the United States of promoting the processes and democratic institutions in Nicaragua ”and“ given the suppression of human rights and democracy ”in that nation.
Among the Nicaraguans who will not be able to enter the United States, as immigrants or non-immigrants, are all members of the Nicaraguan government, including elected officials, mayors, deputy mayors and political secretaries (of the Sandinista party) who participated in “serious abuses or violations of human rights ”, as well as officials from the security and military services, members of the National Police, para-police and paramilitary groups, and the prison system.
Neither may high-level officials of the Judiciary, the Public Ministry and the Ministry of the Interior be admitted; the members of the ministries, regulatory agencies and parastatal companies and the professors of higher public education, among others. The measure also affects the spouses, sons and daughters of the people described, as indicated.
For his part, the Undersecretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Brian Nichols, in his testimony before Congress on Tuesday advocated withdrawing external financing to the Ortega government, within the framework of the RENACER law signed by Biden last week. “As part of the RENACER law, we should look for ways to prevent Nicaragua from obtaining resources from international financial institutions, funds that would inevitably go to its corrupt government,” said Nichols.
The RENACER Law allows the imposition of sanctions on the Ortega government, to restrict loans from multilateral banks and “attack the corruption of the regime.”
Shortly before, from Managua, the Parliament dominated by the ruling Sandinista Front urged Ortega to denounce (declare invalid) the Charter of the Organization of American States (OAS), which would start a process to withdraw the country from the hemispheric body . In a declaration approved in plenary by a large majority of 83 votes, the unicameral Congress asked Ortega “to denounce the OAS Charter, following the mechanism stipulated in Article 143 of the instrument.”
The Nicaraguan deputies thus reacted to a resolution approved by the OAS last week, in which 25 countries did not know the results of the last elections. Parliament described the resolution as “disrespectful, illegitimate and absolutely ignorant of the principles” under which the OAS was constituted, among them “the principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of other states.”
“We are happy, celebrating this declaration that ratifies our sovereignty,” Murillo said minutes later on state television. He added that Parliament’s text “urges to denounce the OAS Charter and to renounce, as a consequence, the permanence in an organization that does not respect even its own founding instruments and only serves the interests of the North American empire.”
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