Three opposition leaders who tried to challenge the president of Nicaragua, the Sandinista Daniel Ortega, in the controversial last elections, were sentenced this Thursday to sentences of 9 to 13 years in prison for crimes considered “treason against the fatherland.”
The three contenders for presidential candidates for the opposition convicted are Arturo Cruz, Félix Maradiaga and Juan Sebastián Chamorroreported the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh), which followed up on the cases, in a statement.
The Fifth Criminal District Judge of Managua, Félix Salmerón Moreno, who was in charge of the case, sentenced Cruz to 9 years and Maradiaga and Chamorro to 13 years for the crime of conspiracy to undermine national integrity in to the detriment of the State of Nicaragua and society.
The court also imposed a 13-year sentence for former Vice Chancellor José Pallais and business leader José Adán Aguerri, and 8-year sentence for opposition leaders Tamara Dávila and Violeta Granera, according to the Cenidh.
Who are the damned?
Cruz, 68, was a presidential candidate by the opposition alliance Ciudadanos por la Libertad (CxL), a group that was removed from the competition with three months to go before the elections of November 7, 2021.
He was ambassador to the United States between 2007 and 2009 of the Ortega government, from whom he distanced himself, and was arrested last June by agents of the National Police at the Managua International Airport when he was returning from a tour of Washington.
Maradiaga, born in 1976 and leader of the Blue and White National Unity, is an academic and activist of liberal roots who was arrested after testifying before the Prosecutor’s Office, where they confirmed that an investigation had been opened.
He grew up in exile in the United States, was Secretary General of the Ministry of Defense with the Government of Enrique Bolaños (2002-2007), and directed the Institute of Strategic Studies and Public Policies (Ieepp).
Maradiaga was accused of allegedly provoking the social uprising against the Ortega government in April 2018, which left hundreds dead and detained, thousands injured, and tens of thousands in exile.
While, Chamorro is the nephew-in-law of former President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro. (1990-1997) and was a pre-candidate for the Presidency for the CxL alliance (center-right).
Trial of Cristiana Chamorro begins
With Cruz, Maradiaga and Chamorro they are Five opposition presidential candidates have been sentenced to between 9 and 13 years in prison for the crime considered “treason.”
The other two are journalist Miguel Mora and peasant leader Medardo Mairena, both sentenced to 13 years in prison.
Conservative lawyer and politician Noel Vidaurre, who also aspired to be a presidential candidate and who remains under house arrest, was found guilty of the crime of conspiracy to undermine national integrity, and the Prosecutor’s Office requested 13 years in prison, a sentence that is pending.
Meanwhile, the trial of the opposition Christiana Chamorro Barrioswhich also tried to challenge Ortega in the last elections, began this Thursday, accused of money laundering, goods and assets, improper appropriation and retention, abusive management and ideological falsehood.
The journalist Chamorro, daughter of former president Barrios de Chamorro and who is also under house arrest, was the opposition candidate for the Presidency of Nicaragua who had the greatest probability of defeating Ortega, according to the polls.
They are part of a quarantine of opposition leaders and critics of the Government who were imprisoned in the midst of a wave of arrests in the context of the general elections last November, in which Ortega was re-elected for his fifth term, fourth in a row and second together. with his wife, Rosario Murillo, as vice president, with his main contenders in prison.
Ortega has branded the imprisoned opponents as “traitors to the country”, “criminals” and “sons of bitches of the Yankee imperialists”. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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