Nicaragua: News & Updates

The ACLU said that more than 900 parents and children, including babies, have been separated by U.S. border authorities since U.S. District Judge Dana M. Sabraw, a George W. Bush appointee in San Diego, ordered the government to reunite more than 2,700 children with their parents more than a year ago. "It is shocking that the Trump administration continues to take babies from their parents," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project. "The administration must not be allowed to circumvent the court order over infractions like minor traffic violations."

"In these times there are those who cheerfully play a war drum without thinking that they put at risk the existence of themselves, I am sure that the American people want peace and justice," said President Daniel Ortega. The head of government said that, regardless of their political position, citizens want peace and economic stability in the midst of a reality that affects the world with so many wars, destruction and exploitation. "This celebration has allowed all of us here to carry a message of peace, resistance and unity to the Nicaraguan people," he said.

Although the political situation has stayed predominately calm, the U.S. State Department has not lowered its travel alert level. This means that universities are not allowing delegations to travel to Nicaragua. Loss of delegations means loss of $100,000 in revenue for the CDCA, and $50,000 worth of donated medications for the clinic.

Despite the new tax increases, Nicaragua has not seen a repeat of last year’s mass protests. And it seems unlikely to, since Ortega, a 73-year-old ex-guerrilla who was first president from 1985 to 1990, forcefully quashed the challenge to his power, including effectively outlawing opposition demonstrations since September....“We are not in the streets because there is a state of terror in Nicaragua, because there are police and shock troops that arrest you and beat you,” said Ana Margarita Vijil, leader of the dissident Sandinista Renewal Movement, which the government accuses of promoting a “terrorist coup.”

Mexico agrees to mediate as veteran rebel leader Daniel Ortega faces biggest challenge: possible expulsion of Nicaragua from the Organization of American States (OAS).

Unanimous approval of a de facto economic embargo on Nicaragua. After defeating a violent US-backed coup attempt, Nicaragua’s elected government faces the NICA Act. The bill aims to force the Sandinistas from power by ratcheting up economic despair.

news coverage of the crisis in Nicaragua has sought to simplify a complex reality. The prevailing coverage lays the blame for the conflict on Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and presents a politically narrow and historically shallow context. As a result, the message implicit and sometimes explicit in the coverage—that Ortega is the villain and his departure from office would end the conflict or solve the problems underlying the crisis—is distorted and misleading.