CSW has today published a new report which finds that the situation of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) and related human rights in Nicaragua has continued to deteriorate.
The report, titled ‘Total Control: The Eradication of Independent Voices in Nicaragua’, states that CSW recorded 222 separate FoRB cases from 1 January 2024 through 31 December 2024, with most cases involving multiple FoRB violations and some affecting thousands of people.
As in the previous year, one of the most commonly reported FoRB violations in the period covered by the report was the arbitrary cancellation of religious events, activities or services. The National Police (PN) continued to forcibly prohibit public religious processions outside their respective physical buildings, which included maintaining a moratorium on traditional public marches by Roman Catholics and Protestants in celebration of the Spanish Bible Translation Day in September.
The report finds that one of the most concerning developments of 2024 was the imposition of what the Nicaraguan government refers to as ‘precautionary measures’ on religious leaders, in which they are assigned a specific local police officer and ordered to report to the officer on a weekly basis to have their photo taken and to submit plans for their weekly activities. Religious leaders subjected to these measures also faced restrictions on their freedom of movement, and some reported that they were warned they would be detained or exiled if they did not obey the terms of the measures.
The report specifically highlights the case of Protestant Pastor Efrén Antonio Vílchez López, a political prisoner who is serving a 23-year sentence on trumped up charges and is experiencing serious health challenges due to complications from inadequately managed diabetes. It also focuses on Catholic lay leaders Carmen María Sáenz Martínez and Lesbia del Socorro Gutiérrez Poveda, who were detained on 10 August 2024 and have now spent over six months in incommunicado detention with no proof of life provided to their families. The Inter American Human Rights Commission has issued a recommendation for precautionary measures in all three cases with no response from the Nicaraguan government. The three are among 46 cases of short- and long-term arbitrary detention of religious leaders documented by CSW in 2024.
The government also maintained its policies of the forcible cancellation of legal status of hundreds of independent civil society organisations, including churches and, in some cases, entire denominations, and of forcibly exiling hundreds of political prisoners.
CSW’s Director of Advocacy Anna Lee Stangl said: ‘Co-Presidents Daniel Ortega and his wife Rosario Murillo, and the Sandinista National Liberation Front, remain set on the eradication of independent civil society and anyone the regime perceives as a critic in Nicaragua. Given that the government remains unresponsive to communications from the Organization of American States and the United Nations, members of the international community must seek creative ways to support and strengthen independent Nicaraguan voices both inside the country and in exile. We thank all those who continue to bravely stand up for human rights and freedom of religion or belief in Nicaragua, and reiterate our continued solidarity with all those working for justice, freedom and democracy in the country.’
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