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PANAMA CITY: The United Nations high commissioner for human rights condemned the “forced disappearance” of a Catholic bishop in Nicaragua, where it said there has been a wave of arrests of religious figures.
Bishop Isidoro Mora was “forcibly disappeared” eight days ago, OHCHR in Central America and the Caribbean posted on social media site X on Thursday.
It accused Nicaraguan authorities of “violating the right to religious freedom, a pillar of any democratic State.”
President Daniel Ortega, a longtime nemesis of the United States, has in recent years clashed with the Catholic Church and targeted clerics for speaking out against his rule.
Mora was a vocal supporter of jailed Catholic Bishop Rolando Alvarez, who is serving a 26-year prison term for treason.
Earlier this year, Alvarez refused to board a US-bound airplane with 222 other political prisoners forced into exile.
Alvarez, the bishop of Matagalpa, was also not included among 12 “indicted” priests in Nicaragua who were released on October 18 and sent to Rome following an agreement between the government and the Vatican.
Relations between the Catholic Church and Ortega’s administration have been tense ever since churches sheltered protesters during the crackdown on massive anti-government demonstrations in 2018.
The Vatican’s embassy in Nicaragua closed earlier this year after Pope Francis in an interview referred to Ortega’s government as a dictatorship.
Bishop Isidoro Mora was “forcibly disappeared” eight days ago, OHCHR in Central America and the Caribbean posted on social media site X on Thursday.
It accused Nicaraguan authorities of “violating the right to religious freedom, a pillar of any democratic State.”
President Daniel Ortega, a longtime nemesis of the United States, has in recent years clashed with the Catholic Church and targeted clerics for speaking out against his rule.
Mora was a vocal supporter of jailed Catholic Bishop Rolando Alvarez, who is serving a 26-year prison term for treason.
Earlier this year, Alvarez refused to board a US-bound airplane with 222 other political prisoners forced into exile.
Alvarez, the bishop of Matagalpa, was also not included among 12 “indicted” priests in Nicaragua who were released on October 18 and sent to Rome following an agreement between the government and the Vatican.
Relations between the Catholic Church and Ortega’s administration have been tense ever since churches sheltered protesters during the crackdown on massive anti-government demonstrations in 2018.
The Vatican’s embassy in Nicaragua closed earlier this year after Pope Francis in an interview referred to Ortega’s government as a dictatorship.
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