Madrid decided on Friday, February 10, to offer Spanish nationality to more than 200 political prisoners released Thursday by Nicaragua and expelled to the United States. Earlier, the Nicaraguan authorities announced that they had launched procedures to declare the deported prisoners stateless.
” The government offers Spanish nationality to these 222 released prisoners following information indicating that the procedure to declare them stateless has been initiated by Nicaraguan authorities, Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares told the Servimedia news agency.
The socialist minister specified that the Spanish authorities were going to get in touch with these political prisoners, deported to the United States. Cuban dissidents, critics of the Venezuelan or Nicaraguan regimes: more and more opponents from Latin America have found refuge in recent years in Madrid, which has become a “new Miami “. Spain has offered Spanish nationality to several of them.
“We are Nicaraguans and we will continue to be”
In Washington on Friday, Guillaume Naudin And Justine Fontaine interviewed Dora Maria Tellez, released and expelled from Nicaragua along with 221 other political prisoners the day before. This old guerrilla sandinistawho had become a great figure in the struggle for democracy, had been imprisoned and sentenced by her former comrade in the fight, Daniel Ortega.
” No one can take our nationality away from us. We are Nicaraguans and we will continue to be. What Daniel Ortega has done is take away the citizenship rights of all Nicaraguans: the right to elect and to be elected, the right to stand as a candidate, the right to freedom of expression, the right to freedom of movement, the right to freedom of organization, these are rights thatOrtega Murillo confiscated from all over Nicaragua “, she confides.
Dora Maria Tellez continues: Yet today we are enthusiastic Nicaraguans and we will continue to be. To take away our nationality, the regime deported us by force, which is prohibited by the Constitution. You cannot force a Nicaraguan to leave the country. I am very grateful to the US government for facilitating our release. And very grateful to the Spanish government for this decision. »
The European Union expressed his satisfaction and relief after the release of these prisoners, three of whom are European nationals. ” The EU continued to demand, by all available means, their release” and “they should not have spent a single day in prison “said Peter Stano, spokesman for the head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell, in a press release.
(and with AFP)
► To read also: Prisoners expelled from Nicaragua: “The country is going further and further in the purification”