{"id":223299,"date":"2022-11-07T12:00:20","date_gmt":"2022-11-07T12:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=223299"},"modified":"2022-11-05T05:02:12","modified_gmt":"2022-11-05T05:02:12","slug":"new-u-s-sanctions-are-designed-to-hit-nicaraguas-poorest-citizens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2022\/11\/new-u-s-sanctions-are-designed-to-hit-nicaraguas-poorest-citizens\/","title":{"rendered":"New U.S. Sanctions Are Designed to Hit Nicaragua\u2019s Poorest Citizens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mainstream media ridiculously claim that Nicaragua is a threat to U.S. national security when it has one of the lowest levels of defense spending in the world.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

[Source: afgj.salsalabs.org]<\/p><\/div>\n

4 Nov 2022 – <\/em>The Biden administration has announced new sanctions which are intended to hit the poorest Nicaraguans\u2014both in their pockets and in the public services on which they depend.<\/p>\n

This latest attack on a small Central American country is, as usual, dressed up as promoting democracy<\/a>: The sanctions will \u201cdeny the Ortega-Murillo regime the resources they need to continue to undermine democratic institutions in Nicaragua.\u201d But everyone knows the real target is ordinary Nicaraguans who voted overwhelmingly to return a Sandinista government in last year\u2019s elections.<\/p>\n

Anyone seeing the NPR news item on the sanctions<\/a> will have read that they are aimed at \u201cNicaragua\u2019s gold industry,\u201d with an implicit message that this hits President Daniel Ortega\u2019s personal treasure chest. The reality is very different.<\/p>\n

Gold mining in Nicaragua\u2014generally speaking carried out in less environmentally damaging ways than in most other countries\u2014is a big export industry, employing thousands of people in one of the country\u2019s poorest regions. It also generates significant tax income for the government, which helps fund its enormous social programs.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Gold miners in Nicaragua. [Source: firstpost.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The sanctions affect not just the gold mining business but all the individuals involved in its management. The obvious aim is to scare away the industry\u2019s investors, administrators and technicians: Put your money in Nicaragua and lose any assets you have in U.S. banks, is the implicit message.<\/p>\n

Was it a coincidence that the sanctions were announced on the same day that the Sandinista government presented its annual budget for 2023? The budget is 14% higher than this year\u2019s, with more than half of the expenditures devoted to social investment. Included in this are the construction of no fewer than nine new public hospitals, adding 4,300 homes to the stock of social housing, bringing electricity to an extra 35,000 households and massive improvements in water and sanitary services.<\/p>\n

Much of the new investment is directed toward the country\u2019s under-resourced Caribbean regions, now properly connected to the main population centers on the Pacific coast by recently completed highways and the huge new River Wawa bridge<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"A
River Wawa Bridge. [Source: jpmass.com.ni<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These regions are a priority\u2014in part\u2014because they were heavily damaged by recent hurricanes. The government\u2019s careful plans to protect people and rebuild affected settlements helped secure the highest levels of support for Daniel Ortega in any region during last year\u2019s elections.<\/p>\n

Is it another coincidence that these are the areas where gold mining is a major source of employment, now to be the specific target of U.S. sanctions?<\/p>\n

The NPR article repeats the Trump-era argument that Nicaragua is \u201ca threat to U.S. national security.\u201d This ridiculous claim, rolled out again to justify Biden\u2019s latest actions, has no basis in reality. Nicaragua is one of Latin America\u2019s smallest and poorest countries, with a population of under seven million, one of the lowest levels of defense spending in the world and a gross national product equivalent only to that of a mid-sized U.S. city. The idea that it threatens the security even of its neighbors is absurd, much less that of the United States.<\/p>\n

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[Source: wikitravel.org<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

The State Department\u2019s press release discloses another reason for the sanctions: Nicaragua\u2019s alliance with Russia. Behind this is Washington\u2019s fear that Latin American countries, and not only those with left-wing governments, are building closer ties both with Moscow and with Beijing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Nicaragua's
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega with Vladimir Putin in Managua in 2014. [Source: news.usni.org<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A second message is: Make alliances with our enemies and you will be punished. Within this is a third implicit message: You may think you are a sovereign state, but according to the \u201crules-based international order\u201d where we decide the rules, you must do as we say.<\/p>\n

More U.S. Political Interference\u2014in Honduras<\/strong><\/h2>\n

As I write this, news comes<\/a> about another example of U.S. interference in the affairs of another country, this time in neighboring Honduras.<\/p>\n

The U.S. ambassador, Laura Dogu, is trying to protect the interests of U.S. companies involved in unconstitutional projects known as \u201cZEDE\u201ds, or model cities, set up by the previous corrupt government, replaced in January by the progressive President Xiomara Castro.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Honduras
[Source: msn.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\"\"
Xiamora Castro [Source: wikipedia.org<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Castro\u2019s foreign minister has formally requested Dogu\u2019s attendance to explain why she is trying to undermine government attempts to re-establish the rule of law in the zones where the ZEDEs were set up, and why she opposes Castro\u2019s other measures to clear up the previous government\u2019s corruption. As a previous ambassador to Nicaragua, Dogu was involved in similar interference there.<\/p>\n

In yet another recent example, The Intercept<\/em> has just revealed<\/a> that, in a report to the U.S. Congress, the Biden administration continues to endorse claims of electoral fraud in Bolivia\u2019s 2019 election, which at the time opened the door for a right-wing takeover of the government that lasted until near the end of 2020.<\/p>\n

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[Source: dailybolivarian.wordpress.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As it happens, the left-wing governments in both Honduras and Bolivia are currently under threat from the right. In Bolivia, the opposition has mounted a general strike in the rich region of Santa Cruz.<\/p>\n

In Honduras, opposition politicians are calling for their supporters to have ready their \u201dwhite shirts,\u201d a symbol of support for disgraced former president Hernandez and the corrupt clan that surrounded him. This is precisely the moment when Washington should be supporting elected governments with whom they may have disagreements, but not undermining them. Or isn\u2019t this what the State Department means when it \u201cpromotes democracy\u201d?<\/p>\n

\"Former
Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hern\u00e1ndez while being escorted onto a plane for extradition to the U.S.\u2014which ironically supported him during his presidency. [Source: cnn.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These actions are part of a wider failure on Biden\u2019s part to come to grips with the renewed emergence of progressive governments in Latin America. The most notable recent example of this was, of course, the embarrassing Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, which many of the continent\u2019s governments boycotted.<\/p>\n

Since then, Colombians have elected the progressive Gustavo Petro as president and Brazilians are, at the second attempt, returning to power their former president, Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva, \u201cLula,\u201d who is also progressive.<\/p>\n

In an article for Al Jazeera<\/em>, Canadian academic John Kirk recently wrote that<\/a> \u201cit is time for the U.S. to recognize that Latin America is being transformed, and the leftist activism of the 2020s represents a clear rejection of the policies of recent decades.\u201d<\/p>\n

He argues that the region is open to dialogue with the U.S., but this has to be a respectful exchange of opinions, not \u201ca top-down lecture.\u201d He may be right: Despite heavy sanctions Venezuela has engaged in spasmodic dialogue with Washington and also, to the limited extent possible, has Cuba.<\/p>\n

Nicaragua, on the other hand, recently refused to accept a new U.S. ambassador, Hugo Rodriguez, after he promised the U.S. Congress that he would \u201csupport using all economic and diplomatic tools to bring about a change in direction in Nicaragua.\u201d<\/p>\n

He went on to call Nicaragua a \u201cpariah state,\u201d displaying precisely the arrogance that Kirk described as the obstacle to any sensible dialogue between Washington and its southern neighbors.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Hugo Rodriguez, who was rejected as the new U.S. ambassador by Ortega\u2019s government. [Source: wochenblatt.cc<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meanwhile, Russia and China (and, indeed, other major states such as India, Japan and South Korea), offer development assistance free of the \u201ctop-down lectures\u201d and \u201cdemocracy promotion\u201d which Washington believes it is entitled to employ. Until successive U.S. governments learn to behave otherwise, they will continue to lose friends in Latin America rather than make new ones.<\/p>\n

_______________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>John Perry is based in Masaya, Nicaragua and writes for the <\/em>Council on Hemispheric Affairs, London Review of Books, FAIR and elsewhere. He can be reached at johnperry4321@gmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 covertactionmagazine.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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