Managua:

In a recent government crackdown on Nicaragua’s catholic churches a total of eleven priests and Siuna bishop Isidoro del Carmen Mora Ortega were imprisoned. In the night between December 29 and 30, six priests from the Archdiocese of Managua were arrested by the police. A few days earlier five priests and Bishop Isidoro del Carmen Mora Ortega were imprisoned,

On December 20, Siuna’s Catholic Bishop Isidoro del Carmen Mora Ortega became the second prelate to be arrested by the Ortega’s regime. Reports said that the Bishop was arrested after praying for Monsignor Rolando José Álvarez Lagos who was sentenced to 26 years of imprisonment by the government in February last year. 

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua Silvio José Báez who was exiled to the United States by Daniel Ortega’s government, requested the world to turn their eyes to Nicaragua in a video message broadcasted on December 30. The Bishop, upon pleading them not to leave alone, asked to offer their prayers for oppressed people and to raise prophetic voices in favor of the persecuted Church. “No matter how much the unjust and violent wage war against the Church, its ministers and all the people of God, it will continue its mission until the end of time,” said the Bishop in his message.

On December 18, the UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Nada Al-Nashif in her statement at Human rights council session expressed her dismay at the Nicaraguan government’s lack of action to prevent the violation and said, the “political and indigenous leaders, members of the Catholic Church, human rights defenders, journalists and other individuals have been systematically targeted by the Government for expressing different views.” She also mentioned that the Catholic Church still faced persecution.