24 de febrero 2022
AA
Share
Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo supported their ally Vladimir Putin this Monday, February 21, after Russia recognized the separatist regions, Donetsk and Lugansk, and ordered the deployment of troops in a series of decisions that the international community denounced as an aggression against Ukraine’s sovereignty.
Ortega dedicated his speech on the 88th anniversary of the assassination of General Augusto C. Sandino, a national hero and symbol of Latin American anti-intervention, to justify Russian aggression days after he had given his support in Managua to Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov, a Putin’s emissary who promised him increased military and commercial cooperation.
“The step taken today by President Putin to recognize these provinces, which are provinces that are populated by Russian citizens; I am sure that if they submit it to an election or a referendum like the one they did in Crimea, I am sure that there the people will vote for even annexing themselves to Russia, which was what Crimea did. It returned to the situation it was in before the fall of the Soviet Union,” Ortega justified.
Ukraine has been an independent state since 1991. It has a population of 44 million inhabitants and experienced an uprising in 2014, which led to the departure of the then President Viktor Yanukovych, a Russian ally, who was replaced by a Western-oriented leader, according to a report by The New York Times.
“What he (Putin) has done is to recognize these republics that, since the 2014 coup, when the coup d’état took place in 2014, these republics that lie on the border with Russia did not recognize the coup governments and they created their own government there, they established their government, they have been fighting, they have fought,” Ortega charged.
According to him, the Ukrainian troops are looking for how to dominate the separatists, how to attack them and when Russia recognized that “logically this brings military support so that those governments have security.” However, in recent weeks the international community has denounced that Putin ordered the movement of thousands of soldiers to the border, a threat of an invasion that Ortega recently described as “a battle for peace.”
The Sandinista ruler accused the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) of being an instrument of the United States in an alleged conspiracy against the pro-Russian government deposed in 2014. According to him, they resorted to terrorism and defamations until the “coup” took place.
“Then the government, the political forces subordinated to US imperialism and European imperialism, who have thought it is time for Europe and the United States to eliminate Russia, without taking into account that there are big changes in the world, that there are other powers in the world, that there is the People’s Republic of China,” he argued.
In an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, the United States denounced Russia’s attack on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, but in Managua Ortega insisted on attacking imperialism and capitalism as well.
“Capitalism has no soul, no feelings. It only has greed, greed and more greed to accumulate capital at the expense of hunger and suffering of millions of human beings on our planet, at the expense of interventions, of destroying States,” Ortega affirmed.
Ortega silent on the death of Hugo Torres
In his public intervention, the strongman spoke for a large part of his speech about Russia, but he kept a conspicuous silence on internal affairs that keep Nicaragua in crisis.
Among the most relevant is the serious human rights situation caused by the repression imposed by the regime, aggravated by the death of retired General Hugo Torres on February 11th, a political prisoner of the dictatorship, which caused worldwide rejection and fueled the demand for the release of 177 prisoners of conscience.
Ortega kept silent on the amply documented denunciations on the enrichment of his family at the expense of the State, after the publication last weekend of a Confidencial investigation on the network of 22 companies, controlled through front men that grew exponentially at the expense of the State and the Venezuelan cooperation.
So far, the regime has responded with intimidation to the question of reporter Octavio Enríquez, currently in exile. Nor did the ruler mention anything about the nepotism of his family, whose monthly salaries were revealed after the data base of the Nicaraguan Social Security Institute was reviewed.
During his speech, Ortega again referred to the opposition protests in Nicaragua in 2018 and insisted that they were victims of “terrorism practiced by the world’s imperialists and traitors,” attacking again as “Judas” and “Caines,” in reference to critics of his government, but did not mention anyone specific by name.
According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, contrary to Ortega’s version, 355 people were killed in the context of the demonstrations, 2,000 were injured and 100,000 went into exile. The State violence has been denounced by members of the international community such as Colombia, United States, European Union, and Canada.
The issue of drug trafficking again became a renewed centerpiece of Ortega’s attack against the United States and Colombia. The first was called the great consumer and the other the great producer of drugs in the world, while he accused Canadian authorities of being repressive after experiencing recent protests. He never said anything about the accusations against him.
Ortega’s regime is experiencing its worst legitimacy crisis after last November elections, in which he secured a fourth consecutive mandate after imprisoning more than 40 people among political, civic and business leaders, among them seven presidential hopefuls of the opposition with whom he eliminated the electoral competition.
The love narrative of Rosario Murillo
Vice President Murillo spoke after her husband’s speech ended and lamented that “the world is full of selfishness” and urged the people to put aside selfishness, vanities and walk in a common sense of brotherhood.
Murillo, accused of being the high official who gave the order of “hitting them with everything” against opponents in 2018, this Monday spoke of dignity, love, faith and Christianity, and that national heroes “strengthen us from above.”
“They make us reach that infinite spiritual force that allows us to transcend…to recognize the grounds and transcend. Recognize hatred, for example, and transcend with love. Recognize evilness, perversion, perversity, and to move forward with love and leave behind those toxic moments, those toxic feelings that can demoralize, depress,” she added.
This article was originally published in Spanish in Confidencial and translated by Havana Times
