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A Nicaraguan official media published the first images in two and a half months of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, sentenced to 26 years in prison, while being visited this weekend by his brothers in a prison near Managua.
In the images, the first since he was taken to a judicial hearing on January 10, the bishop appears dressed in a blue inmate uniform and thinner, but animated while talking with his brothers Vilma and Manuel Antonio in a jail room ” George Navarro”. Álvarez was sentenced to 26 years in prison for various crimes, mainly for “undermining national integrity”, after refusing, a day before, to go to the United States together with 222 released political prisoners and expelled from the country.
The three brothers talk sitting at a table in the video published by the 19Digital portal. The outlet, which also posted photos, said the visit took place on Saturday afternoon.
The Álvarez case is one of the issues of tension between the government of Daniel Ortega and the Catholic Church, while Managua’s diplomatic relations with the Vatican are on the brink of breaking.
Two weeks ago, the Nicaraguan Ministry of Foreign Relations said in a statement that “a suspension of diplomatic relations has been proposed” with the Holy See.
That statement came days after, in an interview with the Argentine portal Infobae, Pope Francis described the Ortega government as a “rude dictatorship” and said that the president suffers from an “imbalance.”
The Vatican’s charge d’affaires in Nicaragua, Marcel Diouf, left the country on March 17. A year ago Ortega expelled the nuncio, Waldemar Stanislaw Sommertag.
On February 10, one day after the release and expulsion of the 222 prisoners, a court sentenced Bishop Álvarez to 26 years and four months in prison and a $1,600 fine. In addition, he deprived him of his Nicaraguan nationality and his citizenship rights in perpetuity. Days before the pope’s interview, Ortega closed two Catholic universities.
Con AFP