Nicaragua Frees 222 Dissidents To US, In Surprise Shift

More than 200 detained members of Nicaragua's opposition were freed Thursday and flew to the United States, in a surprise gesture by President Daniel Ortega, who has faced pressure over growing authoritarianism.

After weeks of quiet talks with Washington, Nicaragua allowed the 222 prisoners including former challengers to Ortega to board a flight to Dulles International Airport near Washington.

US officials said they would allow the prisoners to stay for at least two years and provide medical and legal support.

Ortega did not immediately comment on the release. But Octavio Rothschuh, president of an appeals court in the capital Managua, described the prisoners as having been "deported" and called them "traitors to the homeland."

They were also stripped of their citizenship as well as their political rights for life.

Ariana Gutierrez Pinto, waiting at Dulles airport for her mother Evelyn Pinto, a human rights activist who had been detained since November 2021, said she felt "hopeful."

"To me their release is just because they will no longer live in misery, but it is also unjust because they are being expelled from their country," she said.

The United States welcomed their release but said it was made unilaterally without any promises in return for Ortega, who is under a slew of US sanctions.

The release of the prisoners "marks a constructive step towards addressing human rights abuses in the country and opens the door to further dialogue between the United States and Nicaragua regarding issues of concern," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.

The prisoners' release was "the product of concerted American diplomacy, and we will continue to support the Nicaraguan people."

Blinken said that the prisoners included one US citizen, who was not identified.

Javier Alvarez, a Nicaraguan living in exile in Costa Rica, said that his wife and daughter, who also have French nationality, were among those liberated.

Hundreds of people were sent to prison in Nicaragua in the wake of anti-government protests in 2018 that were met with a brutal crackdown resulting in 355 deaths and more than 100,000 people fleeing into exile.

Dozens of opposition figures were arrested in 2021 -- including seven presidential hopefuls -- ahead of elections. They were accused of undermining "national integrity."

Ligia Gomez, a prominent critic of Ortega now living in the United States, noted that more prisoners remain.

"I am happy for those who are leaving but sad both for those who remain and for Nicaragua," she said.

But Nicaraguan writer Sergio Ramirez, who was Ortega's vice president during his first term from 1985-90, welcomed the releases.

"Today is a great day for the fight for Nicaragua's freedom," Ramirez, who now lives in Spain, said on Twitter.

"They are heading into exile, but they are heading for freedom."

A firebrand Marxist in his youth, Ortega was a former guerrilla in the Sandinista movement who initially took power in 1979 after the fall of the Somoza family dictatorship that was backed by Washington.

The United States supported armed resistance to Ortega and the Sandinista rulers, in one of the most controversial interventions in the last decade of the Cold War.

Ortega was defeated in elections in 1990 but returned to power in 2007, and has since engaged in increasingly authoritarian practices, quashing presidential term limits and seizing control of all branches of the state.

Blinken in his statement said that the prisoners had been detained unjustly "for exercising their fundamental freedoms."

The United States has imposed a series of sanctions on human rights grounds on Ortega as well as Vice President Rosario Murillo, who is his wife.

Ortega has previously mocked the sanctions, calling them "cowardly" and hailing them as "decoration." He has allied himself with Cuba and Venezuela, whose leftist leaders are also under US pressure.