"If the threat is similar and the risks are similar, we will respond in a similar fashion", Pompeo told the House of Representatives' Foreign Affairs Committee when asked if the United States is willing to put sanctions on Nicaragua as it did against Venezuela.
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On 27 February, Nicaragua's government and opposition resumed long-stalled dialogue on resolving the country's political crisis, with Apostolic Nuncio Waldemar Stanislaw Sommertag acting as a mediator. On the same day, the government freed 100 individuals whom the opposition viewed as political prisoners.
Nicaragua has been in a political crisis since April 2018 when people took to the streets to protest unpopular social security reforms announced by Ortega. Despite the president canceling the reforms a few days later, protests ensued with people redirecting their discontent at Ortega.
According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, 317 people were killed in approximately three months following the protests' outbreak. The Nicaraguan Foreign Ministry maintains that the number is 198.
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