United Nations, March 9. Human Rights Watch (HRW) wants the UN Security Council to look into the abuses committed in Nicaragua by the government of Daniel Ortega and considers it vital that the organization’s Human Rights Council renews the mandate of the experts investigating these violations.
This is what the acting director general of the NGO, Tirana Hassan, and its director for the United Nations, Louis Charbonneau, said at a press conference on Thursday.
Hassan said the situation in Nicaragua is “degenerating considerably” and pointed to the government’s recent decision to release political prisoners but strip many of them of their citizenship.
The head of HRW praised the work of the United Nations Group of Experts on Human Rights for the Central American country, which presented a report last week in Geneva denouncing the crimes against humanity committed by the government “as part of a generalized and systematic policy” against sectors of the country’s population for political reasons.
According to Hassan, the work of this group created by mandate of the United Nations Human Rights Council has helped put the Nicaragua issue on the international agenda and document abuses, so it is “key” that his term of office be renewed.
HRW hopes, he said, that these experts can continue to put evidence on the table so that countries impose sanctions on those responsible for these crimes and that there is accountability.
Charbonneau, meanwhile, assured that the New York-based non-governmental organization has been in contact with member states of the Security Council to ask them to raise the Nicaraguan case, either officially or, at least, during an informal meeting.
As he explained, one option would be to invite the members of this expert group to present the findings of their investigations in New York.
The report of this commission, which investigated 159 cases and conducted interviews with 291 victims and witnesses, documents human rights violations such as extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detentions, acts of torture including sexual violence or arbitrary deprivation. of nationality, among other abuses. .