(Managua) Relatives of opponents imprisoned in Nicaragua on Tuesday expressed their “indignation” after statements by President Daniel Ortega who, the day after his controversial re-election on Sunday, described the detainees as “the son of a bitch of the Yanquis imperialists”.
Five groups of relatives of prisoners expressed in a statement their “indignation and concern at the regrettable words, full of hatred, evil and misogyny, pronounced yesterday. [lundi] by Ortega ”.
Relatives are worried “about the possible consequences that this speech can have for the life and physical integrity” of the detainees.
These remarks by the Head of State, they fear, can be “implicitly interpreted as an ‘execution order’, so that police officers and prison officials feel authorized to engage in acts of political revenge against prisoners. people imprisoned ”.
In a speech Monday evening, President Ortega added that the United States should take the opponents prisoners because “they are not Nicaraguans, they have no homeland”.
“Calling political opponents son of a bitch and stateless seems to have the objective of aggravating the dehumanization of detained persons, and of [leur nier] respect for their fundamental rights and freedoms, ”say the prisoners’ relatives.
Some 160 opponents are currently detained “in inhuman conditions” (around 120 since the repression of the spring 2018 protests and 39 since last June, including seven potential rivals of Daniel Ortega), without the right to a fair trial, to receive medication , clothes or blankets, or regular visits from relatives, according to the five groups who signed the press release.
Daniel Ortega was re-elected Sunday for a fourth five-year term with 75.92% of the vote, according to the electoral tribunal. All three opposition parties that could field candidates against him and his wife Rosario Murillo had been sidelined and the seven most threatening potential rivals were arrested.