The U.S. Department of the Treasury sanctioned five senior officials who \u201clead the country\u2019s main financial intelligence, communications, and military agencies,\u201d accusing them of collaborating with the dictatorship to \u201crepress its people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Those newly sanctioned are<\/a>: retired Major General Denis Membre\u00f1o Rivas, director of the Financial Analysis Unit (UAF), and retired Commissioner General Aldo S\u00e1enz Ulloa, deputy director of the UAF; Major General Leonel Guti\u00e9rrez L\u00f3pez, former head of the Army\u2019s Military Intelligence and Counterintelligence Directorate (DICIM). According to sources linked to the Army, Guti\u00e9rrez is now in charge of the Military Hospital\u2019s \u201cmajor business operations\u201d; Johana Flores Jim\u00e9nez, head of the Ministry of Labor, accused of violating the CAFTA trade agreement; and Celia Reyes, deputy director of the Nicaraguan Institute of Telecommunications and Postal Services (Telcor), which promotes internet censorship and troll farms. <\/p>\n\n Economist Juan Sebasti\u00e1n Chamorro, a former political prisoner exiled in the United States and coordinator of Citizens for Freedom in exile, believes these sanctions \u2014 following the recent measures imposed on Commissioner Roberto Guevara, director of La Modelo prison<\/a> \u2014 show that the United States is paying closer attention to the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship, in the context of the pressure it is exerting on the dictatorships of Venezuela and Cuba.<\/p>\n\n In an interview on the program Esta Semana,<\/em> broadcast on CONFIDENCIAL\u2019s YouTube channel<\/a> due to television censorship in Nicaragua, Chamorro analyzed the systemic corruption practiced in Nicaragua for the benefit of the ruling family, the military and police high command, and their associates. He highlighted fiscal and customs extortion against private businesses, as well as the illegal confiscation of the U.S.-Canadian mining company BHMB<\/a> \u2014 an investment of roughly $80 million in Palacag\u00fcina \u2014 which was transferred by the Attorney General\u2019s Office to a \u201cChinese businessman.\u201d<\/p>\n\n \u201cThe complaint by the company\u2019s owners triggered a strange statement from the Attorney General\u2019s Office claiming that property rights are respected in Nicaragua, when no one had even asked them about it. That confiscation will have repercussions (in the United States) for the dictatorship,\u201d Chamorro warned.<\/p>\n\n The Treasury Department sanctioned five senior officials of the Ortega-Murillo regime, including retired General Denis Membre\u00f1o, director of the Financial Analysis Unit (UAF), and its deputy director, retired Commissioner General Aldo S\u00e1enz. What does this sanction mean, and what does the UAF have to do with corruption? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n This sanction is extremely significant because, for several years, there had not been one of this nature, given the number of officials involved and their high rank. It comes in a context where developments in Venezuela have unfolded, Cuba is tense<\/a>, and the United States is saying: of the \u201cTroika\u201d (of dictatorships), Nicaragua is also here, and we are going to deal with them. The waters are starting to stir with the UAF. The statement maintains that the regime uses what should be a technical body \u2014 meant to detect financial flows linked to drug trafficking, terrorism, and weapons of mass destruction \u2014 as a political tool of Murillo and Ortega, to freeze the accounts and assets of opponents, NGOs, and other sectors of the Nicaraguan economy they consider \u201csuspicious.\u201d <\/p>\n\n This sanction has a strong financial intelligence component. Then there is communications intelligence, by sanctioning the deputy director of Telcor, and military intelligence and counterintelligence, by also targeting the head of the Intelligence and Counterintelligence Directorate.<\/p>\n\n The context is important because it comes one week after sanctioning the prison chief, Director Guevara of La Modelo. Now they are moving against elements of repression through financial intelligence, Telcor and the troll farm, military intelligence, and the labor minister. It is clearly tied to the ongoing Section 301 investigation by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, which remains open and is sending a message that the conditions that led to the special tariffs of 10% for next year, <\/a>2027, and 15% for the following year, 2028, are still in place. <\/p>\n\n