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Parliamentary question - E-015834/2015Parliamentary question
E-015834/2015

VP/HR — Situation in Nicaragua

Question for written answer E-015834-15
to the Commission (Vice-President/High Representative)
Rule 130
Ilhan Kyuchyuk (ALDE)

Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in the Central America and Caribbean region. The country is a multi-party constitutional republic, but in recent years political power has become concentrated in a single party, with an increasingly authoritarian executive branch exercising significant control over the legislative, judicial and electoral branches.

As Parliament has stated several times, the human rights situation has deteriorated in the past few years. Violence against women and children, including sexual and domestic abuse, remains widespread and underreported. Additional significant human rights abuses include harsh and life-threatening prison conditions, arbitrary and lengthy pre-trial detention, persecution of the opposition leaders, and the erosion of freedom of speech and press, including government intimidation and harassment of journalists and independent media.

International attention is now needed more than ever, as the National Assembly has approved a bill that scraps limits to the number of terms Nicaraguan presidents can serve, and thus the ruling president, Daniel Ortega, will run for a third successive term in 2016.

Is the VP/HR aware of the ongoing political developments in the country, and in particular the danger of the rise of another totalitarian regime in the region?

Is the VP/HR prepared to send an EU Electoral Observation Mission to upcoming elections?