Freddy Navas

Freddy Alberto Navas, the peasant leader, imprisoned for “loving Nicaragua”

Freddy Navas, 55 years old, peasant leader and coordinator of Movimiento Campesino , which was founded in 2013, an organization that opposes the project to build the interoceanic canal. Navas has worked in defense of the land and in favor of the rights of peasants. As of April 2018, Navas was incorporated in anti-government protests.

He was arrested in 2018, the Public Prosecutor’s Office, charged him with the crime of terrorism for the sole fact of participating in the April protests, and remained 9 months in the Jorge Navarro Penitentiary System known as “la Modelo”. He was released from prison in June 2019 and the Amnesty Law was applied to him, however, since his release, he was a victim of siege, persecution and harassment by the police and para-police at different places where he moved.

Since September 2020, Navas was besieged and pursued by the police at his home. Initially, the police officers arrived at 5:00 a.m. three times a week and remained outside his home, until one day they began to arrive every day prior to his arrest, forbidding him to leave his house, with the excuse that they were “orders from above”.

He was arrested on July 5, 2021, by means of an illegal search without a warrant, and the Public Prosecutor’s Office charged him under the Law of Defense of the Rights of the People to sovereignty and self-determination for peace, charging him with the crime of conspiracy to commit undermining the national integrity for the fact of being considered an opponent of the regime. He was convicted and sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. Upon learning of the guilty verdict, Freddy Navas stated: “if I am guilty of anything, it is of loving Nicaragua”.

It has been denounced by his relatives that, in the cells of the Dirección de Auxilio Judicial, as a form of torture, he is forced to remain without a shirt and without a sheet to cover himself from the cold, he is subjected to prolonged interrogations, and has lost approximately 45 pounds.

The State of Nicaragua continues to ignore all measures in favor of Navas, such as the precautionary measure, number 621-19 issued by the IACHR, to ensure the conditions of detention and adopt measures to protect his life and integrity. During his captivity, he has suffered chronic ailments related to his spine, without receiving proper medical attention.

The State of Nicaragua has failed to comply with the measures ordered by the IACHR and has not ensured detention conditions compatible with international standards.

Freedom for Freddy Alberto Navas!

We demand the Ortega regime: NicasLibresYa!