Will Russia Save Ortega in Nicaragua?

By Circles Robinson

Daniel Ortega receives a medal from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation for “his great contribution to international relations worldwide and between Russia and Nicaragua.”  Photo: screenshot from el19digital, official government website.

HAVANA TIMES – Daniel Ortega hopes that Russia can play an important role in sustaining his government under pressure internationally from most of the Americas and the European Union.  Ortega’s regime is accused of horrendous human rights violations and faces a deflating Nicaraguan economy approaching free-fall under the weight of multiple sanctions.

A visit this weekend from a high-ranking member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (which holds 43 seats in the 450-member Duma) was highly publicized by government media led by the website el19digital.

Dmitry Georgievich Novikov, the first vice president of the Russian parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee as well as the vice president of the Communist Party Central Committee, met with Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, reports the government website managed by Murillo.

The Russian politician bestowed the Order of Friendship of the Peoples of the Communist Party of Russia on commander Daniel Ortega “in recognition for his great contribution to international relations worldwide and between Russia and Nicaragua.”

Back in the 1980s, during the Contra War financed by the United States under then-president Reagan, the Soviet Union through its proxy Cuba helped Nicaragua both defend itself and avoid total economic collapse.

As a small poor country, insignificant in the global economy, Nicaragua could be attractive to Vladimir Putin as a means of reinserting a thorn in the US side — a bargaining chip of sorts to stave off US/NATO pressure on Russia for its land grabs in Crimea and parts of Georgia in Eastern Europe and Eurasia.

Using Ortega for geo-political reasons could save him once again from total collapse. Without support from Russia, the economic future for Nicaragua looks extremely bleak: increasing sanctions from its main trade partner (the US); the intense recession facing his godfather, Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro; and sharply decreasing investment, production, tourism, employment, exports and imports. 

Contrasting silence in the government media

At the same time as it glorified the visit from Russia, the el19digital web platform has as yet refrained from commenting on Thursday’s resignation of the Ortegas’ intimate collaborator and decades-long chief legal advisor, Supreme Court Justice Rafael Solis. 

In his three-page letter of resignation, Solis confessed to having been a part of the crimes against humanity suffered by the civilian population since April 2018, and ordered by the ruling couple. He made clear that the trials being held against the political prisoners, who now number over 500, are rigged to convict them of fabricated charges under orders from Ortega and Murillo.  He also expressed regret for battering the Constitution a decade ago, when rules were changed to allow Ortega to be indefinitely reelected.  

 

9 thoughts on “Will Russia Save Ortega in Nicaragua?

  • La sangre inocente de Somoza esta clamando justicia Ayer fue la llamada dictadura somocista y hoy es la dictadura Orteguista love ironico de esto es que ellos mismos see convirtieron en dictatores pero que see hace a eso se le llama hipocrecia.

  • Summary: Russian regime shamelessly decorates the head of an internationally condemned, dictatorial family dynasty and police state in Nicaragua, responsible for the worst political and humanitarian crisis in decades for “his great contribution to international relations worldwide and between Russia and Nicaragua.”

    A sick joke at the expense of the Nicaraguan people.
    Bravo Russia. Long live the dictator!

  • This crisis began because people voted for him in the first place, knowing he was an illiterate, money-hungry terrorist. Hopefully Ortega ends up like Ghadaffi, with a giant stake up his ass. His cowardly followers will also be held accountable for their brutal murders.

  • Arming common country men with R.P.G’s, AK47 rifles,dragon sniper rifles machine guns is his hopes of fighting off an international intervention force,,,,does he think russia will be there to fight for him ? Nukes would fly,,,be it strategic mini battlefield war heads,,,itnwould turn into a fight between big countries,,,and nica would be finished all together.

  • If it wasnt for the sanctions that this countty and other Nations are putting on other countries trying to get them to comform to their rule of law forgetting about the sufferings their afflicting on the masses of people and the displacement of millions from their homeland.Talk about Russia

  • Bunch of sell out selling themselves to our old imperial enemy. We don’t hope Rusia will save the real pueblo of Nicaragua, but if they lend us a hand, we welcome it, but there are millions of nicaraguenses that will fight the war mongering yanquis and their terrorist using my Azul y Blanco flag to kill.

  • But, where will he flee to now? He had his chance to exit gracefully with his stolen millions. Spain WAS a possibility,, no longer.

    Cuba, Venezuela,, bleak choices,,, and cold in Russia,,, but better than being tried as criminals for the recent murders, and possibly, the abuse of his stepdaughter as well.

    They will be hunted, like Pinochet.

  • History repeats itself. Ortega is doing the very things that Somoza did. At some point Ortega will have to flee in a helicopter in the middle of the night just as Somoza did. A wise man once said that those that do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it.

  • The real reason the inner circle of Ortega is speaking against him or quitting is because they don’t want to end like all the G.N. that they all asasinate during the revolution. They ALL are scared of the Pueblo y la Justicia that awaits. El final es inevitable.

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