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Stock image. A mural of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and the late Venezuelan ruler Hugo Chavez in Managua.
MANAGUA, March 17 (Archyde.com) – The Nicaraguan parliament on Thursday canceled the legal status of 25 non-governmental organizations, bringing the number of those groups suspended in the country to 137, in a series of actions that the opposition classifies as a crusade of the government of President Daniel Ortega once morest civil society.
The Nicaraguan authorities have toughened their policies on the operation of NGOs and universities for a few years, and in recent months opponents were jailed in the framework of the elections that in November meant the re-election of Ortega, branded a “farce” by the United States. .
Among the civil associations that have just been suspended is one that provided free surgeries for children with cleft lips, another expert in electoral observation, and a business sector analysis center that conducted economic impact studies.
The pro-government deputies argue that the NGOs have not accounted for the financing they receive or updated their boards of directors before the Ministry of the Interior, which is the body that regulates them.
“The Cenidh strongly condemns the Ortega initiative to cancel the legal status of 25 civil society organizations that care for health, education, and civil and political rights,” responded the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights in a statement.
Since 2018, when there was an intense wave of protests once morest Ortega, the National Assembly, loyal to the president, has canceled 137 NGOs, most of them critical of the Government. He accuses them of breaking the rules and receiving foreign financing to conspire once morest the president.
Two of the last closed are the Chamorro Foundation, which has not been operating since January 2021 and some of whose directors are in prison accused of money laundering and other crimes, and the Humboldt Center, dedicated to environmental impact studies.
(Reporting by Ismael López; Editing by Raúl Cortés Fernández)
