North Korea recently launched two ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan. The tyrant Kim Jong-Un has initiated 17 such launches so far this year. Almost the entire Western world has condemned his nuclear program.
But in Nicaragua, in the backyard of the United States, the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega has defended North Korea’s initiatives, just as it has defended Russia’s war against Ukraine. Ortega, meanwhile, has announced it will open a permanent embassy in Pyongyang to strengthen bilateral relations.
This is no harmless diplomatic tie. The Nicaraguan dictatorship has stated that nobody has the right to condemn the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea. He also noted that nuclear weapons are the only way to achieve international respect.
Secret relations between the Sandinistas and the North Korean regime date back to 1970, at the time of the guerrillas. In 1971, guerrilla leader Plutarco Hernández, participated in a military training course in North Korea designed to support “the liberation of the peoples” — that is, to impose authoritarian Bolshevik states wherever possible.
In the 1980s, with the Sandinistas in power, North Korean military cooperation and assistance continued, albeit modestly, with weapons, patrol boats and military meddling.
In April 1984, General Humberto Ortega (Daniel’s brother) traveled to Pyongyang to finalize the purchase of weapons, while Nicaraguans were starving. The communist propaganda of that era claimed that the misery was always caused by the blockade and “the empire” — that is to say, the United States. But the Ortega regime’s deprioritization of its own people was obvious even then.
A weakened Daniel Ortega visited North Korea in September 1986. The Marxist dictator met patriarch Kim II Sung, who expressed his solidarity but did not offer the money or weapons that Ortega sought.
In 1990, having been forced by their neighbors to allow free elections, the Sandinistas lost. A democratic government was installed. Four years later, Nicaragua’s North Korean embassy was shuttered. A new Nicaragua stopped looking for weapons and started looking for jobs, investments and a better future.
Unfortunately, in 2007, the Sandinistas returned to power and proceeded to subvert and destroy Nicaragua’s democratic institution. And in 2010, Foreign Minister Kim Hyong Jun visited Nicaragua. Ortega remained cautious and ambiguous about his intentions — he did not want to risk the millions of dollars coming from international cooperation.
Ortega’s second dictatorship has maintained a low-key relation with North Korea for many years. Now an isolated and sanctioned Ortega desperately seeks its embrace and military cooperation.
Nicaragua and North Korea have a lot in common, including unhealthy cults of personality, assassinations and disappearances of enemies, hatred of the American “empire,” the love of dollars, a single party regime, and a family dynasty.
Faced with loneliness and regional rejection, the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship has announced that it is strengthening relations with the triangle of evil: Iran, Syria and North Korea — that is, high-voltage geopolitics, sanctions and misery.
Nicaragua was the only Latin American country that participated in the Russian Vostok 2022 war games. More to the point, it is the only one that openly supports the invasion of Ukraine. Ortega defends the Ukraine War and those who promote it.
Ortega’s actions should have consequences. Nicaragua should also be added to the list of countries that sponsor terrorism, due to its opening of a permanent embassy in North Korea and its strengthening of its relationship with Iran, Syria and Russia.
Ortega continues to enjoy the flow of millions of dollars and euros from free trade agreements with the U.S. and the European Union. It is sad but true that the West’s policy of tolerance has thus enriched and empowered a dictator responsible for crimes against humanity.
The presence of China, Russia, Iran, Syria and North Korea in the backyard of the U.S. is serious indeed. Reagan always warned about the evil ambition of Daniel Ortega, “the little dictator” and “the specter of Nicaragua transformed into an international aggressor nation, a base for subversion and terror.”
These words remain valid today — best not to take them lightly.
Arturo McFields Yescas is an exiled journalist, former Nicaraguan ambassador to the Organization of American States and former member of the Peace Corps of Norway.