Central America
Nicaragua opposition denounces detention of VP candidate
AFP
Nicaragua’s main opposition alliance hit out at authorities on Wednesday after revealing its candidate for the vice presidency has been held under house arrest without any justification.
Former beauty queen Berenice Quezada “was told by judicial authorities and the public ministry that from now on she was under house arrest without access to telephone communications and with restricted movement,” said the Citizen’s Alliance for Liberty (CXL) on its Twitter account.
The CXL said the 27-year-old had been told she is “barred from running for public office” and must remain at her home in the capital Managua under police guard.
Quezada, who was Miss Nicaragua in 2017, was a surprise choice for running mate for the CXL’s presidential candidate Oscar Sobalvarro.
The 68-year-old former right-wing guerrilla was only picked to run in November’s election because five of the alliance’s presidential hopefuls were amongst more than 30 opposition figures detained by authorities over the last two months.
They are accused of treason and threatening the country’s sovereignty under a controversial law approved in December that has been widely denounced as a means of freezing out challengers and silencing opponents.
Critics have accused President Daniel Ortega’s government of trying to prevent any meaningful opposition from standing in November’s election.
Neither the police nor the public prosecutor’s office have confirmed Quezada’s detention.
It came hours after Ortega supporters filed a complaint against her for an “implicit call to violence and hatred,” and demanded that she be prevented from standing in the election.
When enrolling on Monday for the election, Quezada vowed to campaign for the freedom of “political prisoners” and urged supporters to head out in droves to vote “as you did in the streets” in anti-government protests in 2018.
The brutal government repression of those protests left at least 328 people dead and 2,000 injured, according to rights groups.
“We need to show them on November 7 that Nicaragua does not want them in the country,” Quezada had said of Ortega and his wife, Vice-President Rosario Murillo.
Ortega, in power since 2007, is standing for a fourth consecutive term and Murillo is once again his running mate.
The Supreme Electoral Council has until August 9 to either validate or reject the candidates proposed by parties and alliances standing in the elections.
Central America
El Salvador reaches 270 homicide-free days in 2025, PNC reports
El Salvador closed Wednesday, November 19, with zero homicides nationwide, according to National Civil Police (PNC) statistics released early Thursday morning.
The PNC reported that this latest day without violent deaths brings the total to 19 homicide-free days so far in November 2025, including 13 consecutive days. Throughout 2025, the country has accumulated 270 days with zero homicides.
The 270 homicide-free days recorded this year are distributed as follows: 18 in November, 24 in October, 23 in September, 27 in August, 29 in July, 25 in June, 25 in January, 26 in February, 22 in March, 25 in April, and 25 in May.
Authorities attribute these security results to the government’s public safety measures, including the Territorial Control Plan and the state of exception, implemented in March 2022 to combat gang structures.
Since President Nayib Bukele took office in 2019, El Salvador has registered 1,057 homicide-free days, of which 943 occurred under the state of exception.
Central America
Arévalo warns of ‘Dark Interests’ targeting human rights defenders in Guatemala
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo de León warned on Thursday that human rights defenders are facing serious threats, aggression, and criminalization by “dark interests” embedded within the structures of the State.
“Today we are facing serious levels of threats, aggression, and criminalization against people who promote respect for human rights, coming from actors and criminal networks—sometimes embedded in State institutions—that refuse to accept that Guatemala is changing,” Arévalo said during a public event held at the former Government Palace.
During the event, authorities presented the Public Policy for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders 2025–2035, an initiative developed in compliance with a 2014 resolution from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), issued in response to the killing of activist Florentín Gudiel Ramos in 2004.
Central America
Newborn found in Costa Rican dump survives two days in unsanitary conditions
Costa Rican media outlets report that a newborn baby was found in a garbage dump, where he had reportedly spent two days in unsanitary conditions.
Police located the infant after a resident alerted authorities upon hearing crying coming from a clandestine dumping site in the Rancho Guanacaste area. The newborn was discovered alive inside a drainage channel, covered in waste. He was immediately taken to the National Children’s Hospital, where he received medical care and is now in stable condition.
“The National Children’s Hospital confirms that we indeed received a newborn approximately four or five days old who was found in a wooded area near the Alajuelita roundabout. He was first taken to the Solón Núñez Clinic and then transferred to this hospital. As of now, the baby is in the emergency department in good condition. He arrived a bit cold, but he has been warmed, fed, and his initial physical exam is completely normal,” explained hospital director Carlos Jiménez Herrera, according to CR Hoy.
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