The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) denounced this week a serious deterioration in the state of health of six journalists who are imprisoned in Nicaragua. Some are even being tortured, according to a statement from the organization.
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Among the journalists who find themselves in these conditions are Cristina Chamorro, Miguel Mora, Miguel Mendoza, Lorenzo Holmann, Jaime Arellano and Pedro Joaquín Chamorro.
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Regarding the latter, 70 years old, the IAPA stated that he is currently under house arrest due to his health problems. “He lost over 30 pounds in weight and had damage to his ears,” he stated.
According to the Society, Chamorro’s rights to due process and defense, among others, were violated. In June 2021 he was arrested and later sentenced to nine years in prison, accused of appropriation and abusive management.
I have not conspired against anyone, I am innocent.
Also in June 2021, Mora, Mendoza, Arellano and Chamorro were arrested. Holmann, meanwhile, was arrested on August 14 last year.
Mora, for example, was sentenced to 13 years in prison for allegedly undermining national integrity. This is his second arrest for the regime of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua and assures that they have not allowed him to see his son.
“I have not conspired against anyone, I am innocent,” he said during the trial against him.
As reported by the media The printing pressfrom El Salvador, it is estimated that there are currently more than 170 political prisoners in Nicaraguaamong which journalists and opposition presidential candidates stand out, detained since last year before the elections questioned by the international community, in which Ortega won with more than 75 percent of the votes.
“We make them responsible before the international community for what could happen to them, both to them and to the rest of the political prisoners,” said Jorge Canahuati, president of the IAPA.
Massive closure of stations
The Government of Nicaragua created a new informative desert in the interior of the country.
In addition to the complaints from the imprisoned journalists, the IAPA also spoke out this week against the closure of 11 stations and four cable TV channels in Nicaragua as “part of a campaign that seeks to eliminate all vestiges of an independent press”.
Most of the stations confiscated in the department of Matagalpa (central Nicaragua) belong to the catholic churchan action framed in a “climate of police aggression against Catholic temples and priests,” the IAPA warned in a statement.
“With a single blow, the Nicaraguan government created a new information desert in the interior of the country, where the closed stations provided a valuable community service to thousands of people,” added Canahuati.
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With information from Efe
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