This is the latest crackdown by President Daniel Ortega’s government against members of the opposition.
Ortega claimed a fifth term as president last November. In June 2021, his government began using a vague national security law as justification to jail opposition presidential candidates, opposition leaders, journalists, human rights activists and others ahead of November’s elections.
At least 40 opposition figures have been found guilty of conspiring to undermine national integrity and committing financial crimes, according to CNN Español.
Chamorro, a journalist and former director of the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation for Reconciliation and Democracy, was sentenced to eight years in prison and remains under house arrest (CENIDH), according to the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights for money laundering and improper storage. Pedro Vásquez, the journalist’s driver, was sentenced to seven years in prison for money laundering, according to CENIDH.
Administrator of the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation, Walter Gómez, and accountant Marcos Fletes were each sentenced to 13 years in prison for the same crimes, as well as abusive business management and ideological falsehood, according to CENIDH.
The government also sentenced Chamorro’s brother and former Liberal MP Pedro Joaquin Chamorro to nine years in prison for mismanagement and embezzlement, according to CENIDH.
The former presidential candidate, her driver Vásquez, Gómez and Fletes were also fined two, one of $1.6 million and another of 56 million córdobas ($1.56 million), according to CENIDH, CNN Español reported.
All five were found guilty in a closed trial on March 12, 2022, according to CNN Español. They pleaded not guilty and announced they would appeal to the judiciary, according to CNN Español.
Roberto Lario, the official spokesman for Nicaragua’s judiciary, told CNN he had no comment on the trials and the state ministry was not releasing any updates on the trials.