One month after their release from jail and then banishment from Nicaragua, the 222 former political prisoners issued this press release expressing their gratitude and calling for continued pressure on the Ortega-Murillo regime. They still have not been able to be reunited with their loved ones due to actions by the Nicaraguan government blocking access of their family members and children to travel documents.
Press Release: To Nicaragua and the World
(From the 222 recently released political prisoners)
March 9, 2023
We Nicaraguan citizens, former political prisoners and abusively banished by the Ortega-Murillo regime, one month after having been freed from the prisons of the dictatorship and after boarding the historic “Flight to Freedom”, express the following to Nicaragua and the world:
FIRST: We above all are grateful to God for having granted us the miracle of our liberation and having given us the strength to put up with the unjust and illegal abduction of which we were victims, in the midst of inhumane prison conditions, which included physical and/or psychological torture, as well as denigrating, humiliating and degrading treatment for us and our relatives.
SECOND: We profoundly thank our relatives and loved ones, for their unconditional support in those tragic moments of captivity; dealing with harassment, mistreatment, threats and immoral bodily searches on the part of the agents of the penitentiary systems, Police and paramilitary forces of the regime.
THIRD: Our spirit is raised grateful to the People and Government of the United States of America for the enormous efforts that led to our liberation, as well as for the supportive welcome that they offered us in boarding the “flight to liberty” and the granting of a special Humanitarian Parole.
FOURTH: We thank all sister nations that maintained an untiring demand for the liberation of all the political prisoners. In particular, the peoples and governments of: Spain, Chile, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Honduras and Brazil, who have offered us the possibility of receiving their nationality and/or asylum, in the face of being stripped of ours, as well as the migratory facilities announced by Ecuador and Costa Rica.
FIFTH: Our thanks to the different organizations of the Nicaraguan diaspora, in the United States of America as in several other countries; to the independent communications media, Nicaraguan and international; to religious, professional, political and human rights organizations; as well as to all people of good will in the entire world, who have raised their voices to demand our freedom and who continue to accompany us in this legal desert which we continue to traverse, like our families, after our expatriation.
SIXTH: We do not recognize the attempted arbitrary dispossession of our nationality and we declare that our NICARAGUAN NATIONALITY, granted by God at the moment of being born in our beautiful Country of Lakes and Volcanos, brave men and women, sheltered by the blue and white flag, will never be able to be snatched away from us by an illegitimate, criminal and corrupt regime, which has abducted all of our People by force of arms. On the contrary, we continue being proudly “pinoleros”[1], completely certain, as God is alive, that soon we will return to a Country Free for Living! Because to be free, Christ gave us Freedom! (Gallatians 5:1).
SEVENTH: We urge the US Government and other sister nations who have offered us their nationality to carry forward actions leading to our quick reunification with our families, given that the regime continues with its actions of intimidation, threats and harassment against our loved ones; including our children, minors, those with disabilities or other conditions of vulnerability; by blocking them from getting the official documents needed to acquire valid passports to be able to legally leave Nicaragua; exposing them to greater and unnecessary dangers and ongoing revictimization.
EIGHTH: We respectfully request that the US Executive and Legislative Branches consider approving legal mechanisms so that we the 222 passengers of the flight to freedom, as well as the 94 brothers and sisters who later also were illegitimately stripped of Nicaraguan nationality, might be able to receive the condition of refugees or political asylum in an expedited manner, in order to receive the needed assistance on the part of the corresponding federal agencies, and achieve our quick social and labor insertion in this great Nation; access to services of physical and emotional health to overcome the trauma and sequelae caused by the physical and psychological torture suffered at the hands of the agents of the dictatorship, especially for those of the political exiles who are in a condition of greater vulnerability.
NINTH: We denounce the persecution that the Catholic Church is suffering, as well as other Christian denominations in Nicaragua on the part of the regime; which continues jailing and exiling priests, pastors, religious and committed laypeople, who have raised their prophetic voices; announcing the Gospel of Christ and denouncing the injustices which those who wield power in our country commit day to day; violating repeatedly the right to the freedoms of religion, conscience, expression and so many other rights which have been violated for our People.
TENTH: We demand the immediate and unconditional liberation of the 37 political prisoners who remained abducted in the sub-human jails of the dictatorship, especially the Bishop of Matagalpa, Mons. Rolando José Álvarez Lagos, Mons. Leonardo Urbina Rodríguez and the priest Manuel Salvador García; and we urge the international community to continue applying the pressure needed in order to achieve their freedom and the recovery of democracy, progressively snatched away from the Nicaraguan People during the more than 40 years of Sandinista misrule.
ELEVENTH: We ratify our disposition to continue contributing to the unity of the entire Nicaraguan people, inside and outside of the national territory, for the common objective of achieving the definitive liberation and democratization of our Country, which not only implies the end of the criminal and corrupt Ortega-Murillo family dictatorship, but the reconstruction of a new nation, based on principles of governance and democratic institutionality, justice, accountability, transparency, honesty, unrestricted respect for human freedoms and rights, as well as the facilitation of opportunities for the holistic development of all Nicaraguans, without exceptions. Only with true justice will we be able to have a country in peace and prosperity.
TWELFTH: We call on public functionaries and employees: civil and military, that they join the cause for freedom, democracy and the future of our country, given that also those of you who have not participated in crimes against humanity nor acts of corruption directed by those in power, like their families, are hostages of the regime and suffer the social and economic consequences of the authoritarian drift, threats and persecution of the Ortega Murillo family dictatorship; including the prohibition to get passports and freely leave the country.
Maintaining our absolute trust place in Jesus Christ, our Lord, we sign this from the United States of America on the 9th day of the month of March of 2023.
God, Country and Liberty!
[1] Refers to people who drink a national beverage made from a combination of roasted corn and cacao.