GUATEMALA CITY – The U.S. government announced Thursday that it secured the release of 135 Nicaraguan political prisoners, who have arrived in Guatemala where they will apply for entry to the United States or other countries.
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said in a statement that they were released on humanitarian grounds.
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“No one should be put in jail for peacefully exercising their fundamental rights of free expression, association, and practicing their religion,” Sullivan said.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Eric Jacobstein, speaking with reporters, said that the Nicaraguan government received nothing in exchange for the prisoners' release and the negotiation signaled no change in U.S. policy toward the government of President Daniel Ortega.
“Though the pressure itself has been consistent, the planning and execution of this release was rapid, and we’ve worked quickly to facilitate the travel of these individuals and really ensure their safety at every step of the journey,” Jacobstein said, adding that Nicaragua continues to “unjustly” detain people.
Asked if there were some prisoners Nicaragua was willing to release, but who refused to leave, he declined to comment.
Jacobstein, who greeted the Nicaraguans in Guatemala, said “these are individuals, some of whom have been victims of torture ... who’ve had an extremely difficult time, we did find them generally in very good health and spirits.”
One thing that struck the U.S. diplomat about some of his conversations with the prisoners was the “true pettiness and cruelty” of Ortega’s government for imprisoning people for no justifiable reason.
Francisco Arteaga, a released prisoner who spoke from the window of the yellow bus carrying him and others from the air field, was asked why he had been arrested. “For spreading on social media the government’s actions against the Catholic church,” he said.
Among the Nicaraguans released were 13 members of a Texas-based religious charity, Catholic laypeople, students and others.
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo agreed to host the Nicaraguans while they apply for entry to the U.S.
The Nicaraguans rolled out of a Guatemalan air base in the capital on buses Thursday morning, with some waving from the windows.
Nicaragua’s government did not immediately confirm the announcement on the prisoners’ release.
Nicaraguan human rights advocate Haydeé Castillo said the release of the prisoners was a “triumph for the Nicaraguan people’s resistance.” She noted that the prisoners weren’t really freed because their release comes with forced displacement from their country.
“Nobody should be held prisoner for thinking differently,” Castillo said.
She said advocates were reviewing lists to see how many such prisoners remain in custody.
Ivannia Alvarez, an exiled Nicaraguan and member of the Recognition Mechanism for Political Prisoners, said that her most recent count had been 151 jailed, suggesting that some of them are still detained.
The Texas-based religious organization Mountain Gateway confirmed the release of 13 of its people after nine months in jail.
“This is the day we have prayed for,” pastor Jon Britton Hancock, Mountain Gateway’s founder, said in a statement.
Environmentalist Amaru Ruiz said on social platforms that among those released were eight Indigenous forest rangers.
“The United States again calls on the government of Nicaragua to immediately cease the arbitrary arrest and detention of its citizens for merely exercising their fundamental freedoms,” Sullivan said.
The U.S. government referred to them as political prisoners and prisoners of conscience.
The announcement came just two days after Nicaragua’s National Assembly approved changes to the criminal code allowing the government to try Nicaraguans and foreigners in absentia.
Opponents and organizations that have fled or been forced into exile in President Ortega’s yearslong campaign to silence critical voices could be fined, sentenced to lengthy prison terms and see their property seized by the government under the approved changes.
Last year, the government exiled more than 300 opposition figures, stripping them of their nationality. Far more Nicaraguans have fled into exile themselves to escape the repression that followed massive 2018 protests that Ortega dubbed a failed coup with international backing.
“These individuals safely and voluntarily arrived in Guatemala," U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement. “We thank President Bernardo Arévalo and his administration for their efforts and support in welcoming them.”
“Nicaraguan authorities unjustly detained these individuals for exercising their fundamental freedoms of expression, of association and peaceful assembly, and of religion or belief,” Blinken said.
The government has shuttered more than 5,000 organizations since 2018, many of them religious in nature.
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Associated Press journalists Santiago Billy in Guatemala City, Matthew Lee in Washington and Gabriela Selser in Mexico City contributed to this report.