Nicaragua halts entry of new U.S. ambassador

The regime of Daniel Ortega has withdrawn its approval for the entry of the new U.S. ambassador to Nicaragua, Hugo Rodríguez, whom it accused of issuing "interfering and disrespectful" statements against his country.

"The Government of Nicaragua, in use of its faculties and in exercise of its national sovereignty, immediately withdraws the approval granted to the postulant Hugo Rodríguez", sentenced the Nicaraguan Foreign Minister, Denis Moncada, in a press release.

In the press release, the Nicaraguan Foreign Minister attempts to justify the decision on the grounds that Hugo Rodriguez offered "interfering and disrespectful statements against our country".

In May 2021, President Joe Biden nominated Rodriguez to fill the position of ambassador to Nicaragua as a replacement for Kevin Sullivan. Before a U.S. House committee, Rodriguez declared that Nicaragua "is increasingly becoming a pariah state in the region".

During the US Senate session, where Rodriguez's nomination was reviewed, he considered that "taking Nicaragua out of the Free Trade Agreement is a potentially very powerful tool and something we have to seriously consider" to sanction Ortega.

A regime sustained with repression

Joe Biden criticized Nicaragua's 2021 presidential elections, which he called a "pantomime of elections that were neither free nor fair, and certainly not democratic."

Nicaragua and the US maintain tense relations, following Ortega's response to opposition protests against his government in 2018, which left at least 355 people killed by the state in three months; actions that exposed the despotic and tyrannical character of a regime that as of today already has 5 terms in power inflicting repression and poverty on the Nicaraguan population.