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The arrest of “News” editor Juan Holman Chamorro is the latest move by President Daniel Ortega to suppress opposition figures.
Nicaraguan police arrested a senior editor of a newspaper criticizing President Daniel Ortega Months of repression Before the November elections, opposition leaders and potential challengers.
In a statement on Saturday, the country’s national police stated that it had arrested Juan Hollman Chamorro of La Prensa. The publication strongly criticized Ortega on charges of customs fraud and money laundering, property and assets.
They said that the case is being handed over to the authorities for “prosecution and determination of criminal responsibility.”
On Friday, after La Prensa stated that it could no longer distribute print editions, the police raided the newspaper’s offices because the government was detaining its paper.
On Friday night, Ortega accused the paper of “liing, slandering, slandering, money laundering and not paying taxes.”
The 75-year-old President of Nicaragua is facing increasing international pressure to explain the wave of arrests against opposition figures in Central American countries before the November 7 vote.
Since the beginning of June, dozens of opposition leaders and presidential candidates have been arrested in Nicaragua because the government arrested those accused of planning a coup against Ortega.
Human rights organizations and international observers accused the Sandinista party leader of strengthening authoritarianism, saying that the wave of arrests was designed to clear the way for Ortega to win the fourth consecutive presidency.
The United States and the European Union criticized the upcoming vote for “lack of any legitimacy” and pointed to Nicaragua’s arrests and recent decisions. The electoral body that disqualifies the opposition coalition Seek to challenge Ortega.
Both the United States and the European Union have imposed sanctions and visa restrictions on senior Nicaraguan officials, including Vice President Rosario Murillo, who is also Ortega’s wife.
Nicaragua “the electoral process, including its final result, has lost all credibility”, US Secretary of State Anthony Brinken Said in a statement last weekend.
The vice president of La Prensa is Cristiana Chamorro, the opposition presidential candidate His home was raided in early June And whose family owns the newspaper. She is one of seven potential challengers for Ortega who is currently being held.
La Prensa is the only national independent daily newspaper still in circulation in the country.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and its special rapporteur on freedom of speech criticized Friday’s raid on the newspaper’s office and condemned “the continuing persecution of the press by Nicaraguan officials”.
They stated on Twitter that “direct or indirect pressure aimed at suppressing journalism will affect democratic debate and is incompatible with the right to freedom of speech.”
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