Allegations of human rights abuses by the leftist president were said to be those responsible for the killings and disappearances of protestors
Nicaraguan exiles have blamed the government of president Daniel Ortega and other leftwing groups for the killings and disappearances of protestors during protests that erupted in mid-April.
Human rights groups reported 1,339 people were killed and 1,917 injured during the eight-week protests, which gave way to what activists called the worst repression since the Sandinista insurgency swept to power in 1979.
Local news reports said one protestor killed and one detained died during an assault on a town in Ortega’s home province, Managua.
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Tomás Borge, a former Sandinista commander, said activists in Nicaragua were “mad as hell” that dissidents were not being prosecuted for killings and disappearances.
In addition to those police who were detained, two Nicaraguan state security officials were killed by security forces in what officials described as a clash with opposition fighters.
“The families of the disappeared… the family of the dead… the family of the wounded, those [who are] beat and left in the street… they are asking for justice and they are going to get it because they are the ones who have been assassinated and disappearances,” Borge told Reuters.
The renewed battles between pro-government paramilitaries and some of the most powerful opposition groups, the National Opposition coalition, has driven many people to flee the country. Thousands of young Nicaraguans have fled to the United States, including officials and activists from the Nicaraguan branch of the Lutheran church who fled after being assaulted on several occasions.
As Ortega’s guaranteed re-election brought in his fifth term as president on 8 May, the government accused pro-democracy activists of being “terrorists” seeking regime change. His legal office declined to comment on the report.