Nicaraguan authorities confirmed Sunday that there’s been a ‘suspension of diplomatic relations’ with the Holy See after Pope Francis compared Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega to notorious Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
The Foreign Ministry of Nicaragua issued a statement affirming the news after reports emerged that the Vatican Embassy in Managua and the Nicaraguan Embassy to the Vatican in Rome had both been closed.
Ties between the Central American country and the Catholic Church have been strained since high-ranking clergy lent their support to violent riots which devastated Nicaragua’s economy and left hundreds dead in 2018.
Last week, relations plunged to a new low after the pope insisted in an interview with Infobae that Nicaragua’s elected government is akin to the "1917 Communist dictatorship or that of Hitler in 1935."
Francis seemed particularly incensed by the incarceration of Bishop Rolando Alvarez – a "very serious man," he declared – who was sentenced to 26 years in prison last month for conspiring to undermine national integrity.
The charges relate to Alvarez’s role in the chaos which engulfed Nicaraguan cities in 2018 as US-government linked forces attempted a violent overthrow of the government.
Alvarez continues to insist he maintained a neutral position, but he was recorded taking the side of rioters in a dispute with foreign truckers who’d been stranded as masked, gun-toting militants erected barricades across the country.
As a Costa Rican trucker pleaded with the bishop to intervene and order rioters to allow him and his cohorts to escape from the country, footage showed Alvarez refusing, jamming his finger toward the man’s chest instead, and barking: "Respect the homeland!"
When the Biden administration welcomed 220 other convicted Nicaraguan criminals to the US last month, Alvarez was offered the opportunity to flee as well, but in an apparent political statement, he refused to be transported.