Nicaragua’s ambassador to the Organization of American States has launched an extraordinary verbal attack on the authoritarian government he is employed to represent, castigating Daniel Ortega’s “indefensible” dictatorship for its assault on human rights and democracy.
Arturo McFields Yescas spoke out during an online OAS session on Wednesday, in a startling declaration that spread quickly on social media and was commended by countries such as the US.
Palabras del Embajador de #Nicaragua Arturo McFields Yescas al Consejo Permanente de la #OEA pic.twitter.com/cMNiv69CIh
— OEA (@OEA_oficial) March 23, 2022
In it, the Nicaraguan diplomat said he was speaking out “in the name of the 177 political prisoners and the more than 350 people who have lost their lives” since the failed 2018 uprising against Ortega and his vice-president and wife Rosario Murillo.
“It’s not easy to denounce my country’s dictatorship – but to carry on in silence and defending the indefensible is impossible,” said McFields, a former journalist who is the son of the Nicaraguan poet David McFields.
“I must speak out, despite the fear. I must speak out even though my future and that of my family are uncertain. I must speak out otherwise the stones themselves will speak for me,” added the ambassador, who was appointed by Ortega late last year.
The public rebellion came two days after Cristiana Chamorro, the jailed opposition politician who was tipped to challenge Ortega for power in last November’s election, was sentenced to eight years in prison for what her supporters call trumped-up charges of financial crimes.
Chamorro is one of scores of opposition figures who were imprisoned in the lead-up to that vote, as part of a ferocious crackdown on Ortega’s political rivals. With his foes in jail or exile, the former revolutionary hero secured another five years in power in an election the US president, Joe Biden, called an undemocratic “pantomime”.
That means the the 76-year-old Sandinista, who has governed continuously since being elected in 2006, could rule the Central American country into his 80s.
Ortega’s ambassador painted a bleak picture of the situation in Nicaragua under his strongman boss. “Since 2018, Nicaragua has become the only country in Central America – and probably Latin America … where there are no printed newspapers, where there isn’t the freedom to publish so much as a tweet or comment on social networks … [and] there are no human rights organizations.
“One hundred and seventy thousand Nicaraguans have fled the country and others are fleeing right now as I speak,” McFields added, before insisting there was hope. “There are people, both in and outside of government, who are tired of this dictatorship and its actions.”
Nicaragua’s foreign ministry claimed McFields did not represent Ortega’s government and argued his comments therefore lacked “validity”. However, only on Monday the website of one government-backed group run by one of Ortega and Murillo’s children had described him as Nicaragua’s OAS ambassador.
