The degradation of human rights in Nicaragua has reached alarming levels, as confirmed by the United Nations Group of Experts on Nicaragua, which recently noted an escalation in persecution against dissent and the suppression of independent academic institutions. Ortega y Murillo’s authoritarian tandem closed in 2023 the Central American University, an educational pillar of the country since 1960, and canceled the legal personality of 27 institutions, demonstrating the instrumentalisation of the State to restrict freedom and academic spaces. In the turbulent Nicaraguan scenario, marked by the growing repression of Ortega’s dictatorial regime, the figure of Doña Vilma Núñez de Escorcia emerges, one of the more than 300 people arbitrarily deprived of her nationality. This historic activist, survivor of the 1959 student massacre, was imprisoned and tortured in 1979 for denouncing human rights violations under the Somoza dictatorship and today, at 84, keeps leading the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights and face constant threats from the authorities. The persecution suffered by Doña Vilma is just one example of Ortega’s oppressive regime, which in 2023 banished more than 200 opponents and left them orphans of nationality.
This is also the case of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, sentenced to 26 years for “treason to the homeland”, deported in 2024, and whose current situation is unknown. Nicaragua has been stripped of independent institutions, its intellectual capital, critical voices, freedom, democracy and rights. Those who denounce human rights violations in Nicaragua or express their opposition to the Ortega regime are condemned to prison, persecution or statelessness.
Soraya Rodríguez, first-hand knowledge of this dramatic reality, has been a fundamental piece in the promotion of the candidacy of Vilma Núñez and Bishop Rolando Álvarez for the 2023 Sakharov Prize. Rodriguez, a member of the parliamentary committees on Foreign Affairs and Development, supported and defended in September the candidacy of both human rights defenders, representing the entire Nicaraguan people, and has worked tirelessly to give visibility to the situation in the country and to bring the voice of women and men who fight for freedom in Nicaragua to European institutions.
The European Parliament’s decision on the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought 2023 was revealed on 12 October of that year, following a secret vote by the parliamentary committees on Foreign Affairs and Development. The three finalist nominations included Jina Mahsa Amini and the Women, Life and Freedom movement of Iran; Vilma Núñez de Escorcia and Bishop Rolando José Álvarez Lagos of Nicaragua; and Women Fighting for Legal, Safe and Free Abortion in Poland, El Salvador and the United States. Finally, Parliament awarded the prestigious prize to Jina Mahsa Amini and the Women, Life and Freedom Movement in Iran.
To be a finalist of this candidacy, however, is an important milestone to publicise the situation that is being experienced in Nicaragua. It serves to recognise, in turn, the immeasurable courage of Doña Vilma and Bishop Rolando Álvarez, who have not renounced, not a single day of their lives, to defend the fundamental rights of Nicaraguans. The prize could not be collected by the finalists due to the impossibility of leaving Nicaragua. The event was attended by Father Uriel, representing Bishop Rolando Álvarez, and Sara Henríquez, Nicaraguan human rights defender in exile.
The struggle for freedom in Nicaragua finds in Vilma Núñez a woman at the forefront, despite adversity, of human rights. The Euro Parliament thus demonstrates the European Union’s commitment to upholding fundamental values around the world. According to Soraya Rodríguez, he sends a clear message to Ortega: Europe stands by the Nicaraguan people and will continue to denounce the regime’s abuses until they are over.
Audiovisual gallery
Soraya Rodríguez together with Sara Henríquez, Nicaraguan human rights defender in exile, representing Doña Vilma Nuñez, and Father Uriel, representing Bishop Rolando Álvarez, finalists Sakharov Prize 2023
Media Seminar – European Parliament Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought – Meeting with finalists. Photographer: Alain ROLLAND. Copyright: © European Union 2023 – Source : EP. Usage terms: Identification of origin mandatory.
