The 54th General Assembly of the Organization urges member states to intensify “efforts” for the “cessation of human rights violations”
The 54th General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS) on Thursday approved a resolution to follow up on the situation in Nicaragua, in which it urges member states to intensify “efforts” for the “cessation of the violation of human rights” in that country.
The resolution, approved by the foreign ministers and representatives of the 32 active members of the organization, asks its member states to adopt measures to end the “ideological persecution” in the Central American country. Nicaragua officially left the OAS in December 2023 at the request of its president, Daniel Ortega, and Venezuela is suspended.
It also urges the “Government of Nicaragua for the immediate and unconditional release of all persons who have been deprived of liberty for political or religious reasons.”
Nicaragua’s relations with the international community have been strained since the repression of the 2018 protests against Ortega, who has been in power since 2007 and has successively re-elected in electoral processes that were disqualified by the OAS for lacking “democratic legitimacy.”
U.S. Deputy Secretary Richard Verma, his country’s representative to the organization, said at a press conference that the resolution shows that the “people of Nicaragua” have not been “forgotten” and assured that the U.S. government “will continue to denounce” human rights violations under the mandate of Ortega and his wife, the Nicaraguan vice president. Rosario Murillo.
“We will continue to shed light on what the Ortega-Murillo regime is doing and advocate for the rights of the Nicaraguan people to be respected in compliance with their current inter-American obligations,” the official said.
On June 18, the OAS Security Council had already issued a draft resolution. The document approved on Thursday called for the “cessation of all violations of human rights and to take effective measures for the restoration of democratic institutions, especially their obligation to observe the rule of law and human rights.”
The General Assembly also approved a resolution focused on mitigating the humanitarian and political crisis in Haiti, which is mired in a deep wave of insecurity due to the war between gangs, which has already left more than 1,500 dead so far this year.
The document provides for the “continuation” of efforts for the “immediate restoration of security, the strengthening of humanitarian assistance, the promotion of socio-economic development and the provision of assistance for the protection of human rights and democracy in that Caribbean country.
The 32 members of the OAS inaugurated their 54th General Assembly in Paraguay on the eve of the day, overshadowed by the attempted military uprising in Bolivia, which captured the world’s attention and marked the opening speeches and the first session of the foreign ministers this morning.
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