Nicaragua's lawyer before the International Court of Justice, Paul Reichler, resigned from office for “moral conscience”

Attorney Paul Reichler, who represented Nicaragua before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in several international litigations, resigned from the post because of “moral conscience”, denouncing the way Daniel Ortega runs the country.

“My moral conscience demands that I must sever my ties with the second Ortega (starting in 2018) and refuse to serve him,” Reichler said in a letter of resignation published this Sunday on the digital media Confidential.

Reichler was part of Nicaragua's teams of lawyers in the case known as “Iran-Contras” with the United States, that of the Caribbean Sea with Colombia, or the San Juan River with Costa Rica, which the Nicaraguan government counted as “victories.”

“I will pray for the day when Nicaragua will be free again,” Reichler said in the letter, which is addressed to the Nicaraguan dictator.

In the letter, the lawyer divided Ortega into two characters, one prior to 2018, which he called democratic and peaceful, and another from that year, which he points out of acting “so ruthlessly, resulting in hundreds of tragic deaths”, as well as arresting and prosecuting dozens of people “on false charges that are nothing more than a pretext to eliminate dissent and opposition”.

Reichler said he was “honored and proud to have helped Nicaragua defend and extend its sovereignty,” but he did not hide his bewilderment at Ortega's decisions, which he accused of having “destroyed democracy” and establishing “a new dictatorship, not unlike” the one he “helped to overthrow.”

TREATMENT OF PERSONALITIES

The letter - the lawyer told Ortega - is “to end my relationship with you and your Government. I don't know what made you change, but you are no longer the Daniel Ortega whom I respected, admired, loved and served with pride for so many years.”

He stressed that his regime made “false elections, maintains a submissive legislature, a corrupt judicial system unable to deliver justice, and the silencing of freedom of expression and independent media.”

He was also criticized by sending to exile the 2017 Cervantes Prize by Sergio Ramírez, Commander Luis Carrión, Ortega y Gasset 2021, Carlos Fernando Chamorro, writer Gioconda Belli, economist Edmundo Jarquín, and former Sandinista guerrillas Monica Baltodano and Julio López Campos.

He also referred to the dissident former Sandinista guerrilla fighter Hugo Torres, the historic “Comandante Cero”, who died in police custody after eight months in prison and without being tried.

“I find it unthinkable that Daniel Ortega would have murdered Hugo Torres and sadistically led the other great patriots, now locked in their cells, to the brink of hunger and death,” he said.

Reichler ended his relationship with Ortega a week after Nicaraguan diplomat Arturo McFields denounced that Nicaragua has a” dictatorship”, during a session of the Organization of American States (OAS), after which he was removed from his post as ambassador to the organization.

(With information from EFE)

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