Ortega arrests two senior priests in continued crackdown on Nicaraguan clergy

Ortega arrests two senior priests in continued crackdown on Nicaraguan clergy

Police in Nicaragua have arrested two more Catholic priests after they prayed in public for a bishop jailed for life when he refused to go into exile.

The arrests of Fr Carlos Aviles and Fr Hector Treminio raise the numbers of priests arrested by the regime of President Daniel Ortega to six in the past week alone. A total of nine priests are said to be in jail, accusing of crimes against the state.

According to Reuters news agency, the pair were detained after they offered prayers for Bishop Rolando Álvarez of Matagalpa who in February was jailed for 26 years after he refused to board a plane which would take him to exile in the United States with 222 other political prisoners.

Fr Aviles was described in the report as the most senior cleric of the Archdiocese of Managua after Cardinal Leopoldo Brenes, while Fr Treminio is the archdiocesan treasurer.

The previous week, police also arrested and allegedly beat Bishop Isidoro del Carmen Mora Ortega of Siuna after he prayed in public for Bishop Álvarez amid grave concerns at reports of his failing health.

Bishop Mora Ortega, 63, was arrested in the parish of Santa Cruz, in the municipality of Rio Grande, while travelling to administer the sacrament of confirmation to 230 Catholics. Two seminarians were also detained.

The Catholic Church has been a consistent target hard-left President Ortega, who in October exiled 12 priest to Rome following a deal with the Vatican.

His regime has aggressively opposed the Catholic Church in recent years because of its sympathy for the mass protests against his administration in April 2018, which he has described as an attempted coup.

The President accused the Church of supporting the protests and waged a campaign against the clergy along with political dissidents and opponents and the free Press.

Earlier this year, it was reported that since 2018 the Nicaraguan regime has launched more than 500 attacks against the Catholic Church.

Among the property and assets seized by the government was the Jesuit-run Central American University, which was taken over by the state in August on the grounds that it was functioning as a “centre of terrorism”.