The Foreign Committees of the US Senate and House of Representatives wrote this Friday to the presidents of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras for their governments to ensure that Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI) does not contribute to perpetuating the dictatorship in Nicaragua.
“Given the crimes against humanity perpetrated by the Ortega-Murillo regime, we urge your country to use its leadership as a founding member of the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI) to ensure that their loans do not perpetuate the consolidation of the dictatorship in Nicaragua,” they said.
The letter from the presidents of the Senate and House Foreign Committees, the Democrat Robert Menendez and the republican Michael McCaulwas addressed to the leaders of Honduras (Xiomara Castro), Guatemala (Alejandro Giammattei), Costa Rica (Rodrigo Chaves) and El Salvador (Nayib Bukele).
The text urges them to “use your voice” and to vote for CABEI to increase its transparency and scrutiny over loans made to the Nicaraguan regime.
In recent years, as they recall, that entity has approved some $3.5 billion in funding for initiatives that were to be launched under the auspices of the Nicaraguan dictator, Daniel Ortega, and his wife, Rosario Murillo.
These funds come at a time of “growing global condemnation of human rights violations” in Nicaragua, criticized the two legislators.
The letter requests exercise greater control over that bank’s loans to the country until Ortega and Murillo agree to start negotiations in favor of democratic governance, respect for human rights and a road map that leads to free and fair elections.
Nicaragua has been going through a political and social crisis since April 2018, which worsened after the controversial general elections on November 7, 2021.
Ortega was re-elected in those elections for a fifth term, his fourth in a row and the second along with his wife, Rosario Murillo, as vice president, with their main contenders in prison or in exile.
The legislators pointed out that although the release in early February of 222 political prisoners suggested an eventual political opening, the decision to expel them from the country to the United States and strip them of their nationality ended that hope.
(With information from EFE)
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