Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and a special envoy from the Chinese government attended the ceremony.
Daniel Ortega, here at a conference in Cuba in December, has been sworn in for a fourth consecutive term.
(dpa)
After his controversial re-election, Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega was sworn in for a fourth consecutive term. The 76-year-old took his oath on Monday in Revolution Square in the capital Managua. Before the swearing-in ceremony, the EU and the US announced further sanctions against supporters of the authoritarian ruling Ortega, who are said to be responsible for human rights violations.
Ortega was accompanied by his closest allies during the celebrations. The Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and the Venezuelan Head of State Nicolás Maduro as well as a special envoy from the Chinese government attended the swearing-in ceremony. It was not until December that Nicaragua ended its diplomatic relations with the democratic island republic of Taiwan after three decades and formally switched to China.
Before the November election, Ortega had more than 30 political opponents and critics arrested, including seven presidential candidates. The former Sandinista revolutionary was in power after the overthrow of dictator Anastasio Somoza from 1979 until he was elected in 1990 – first as part of a government junta and then as president. In 2007 he was again head of state and government. A limitation of the presidential term of office was abolished by constitutional reform. Ortega’s wife Rosario Murillo has been Vice President since 2017.