This Monday the National Police used force to repress a group of people who had come together outside the offices of the  Confidencial newspaper to express their opposition to the acts that took place two years ago, December 14, 2019, when the Police violently broke into and searched these offices as well as those of the  Segovias Leadership Institute, the POPOL NA Foundation, the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (CENIDH), the Río Foundation, IPADE and the Health Services and Information Center  (CISAS).

Among the people attacked by the police were CENIDH President Vilma Núñez, along with CENIDH defenders Georgina Ruiz, Francely Navarro and Julia Baltodano, who have all been granted provisional measures by the Inter-American Human Rights Court (IHR Court). The protesters included Cabal Director Desirée Elizondo, Confidencial Director  Carlos F. Chamorro, Confidencial General Editor Arlen Cerda, Franklin Villavicencio and Leonel Gutiérrez, all of whom have been granted precautionary measures by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR),along with Confidencial journalists  Juan Carlos Bow and Ivette Munguia.

It is important to underscore the fact that two years after these acts, the Segovias Leadership Institute, the POPOL NA Foundation, CENIDH, the Río Foundation, IPADE, IEEPP, CINCO, Let’s Make Democracy, and the Health Services and Information Center (CISAS) have been unable to recover their legal status that was canceled and their property that was confiscated. 

We of IM-Defensoras condemn this aggression and reiterate our call on the international community to stay alert to the situation of human rights violations, political persecution and repression suffered by the news media and organizations defending human rights in  Nicaragua.