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Biden calls Nicaragua's election a 'pantomime' that's 'neither free nor fair'
![Biden calls Nicaragua's election a 'pantomime' that's 'neither free nor fair']()
Mr Ortega has secured around 75% of the vote. Biden calls Nicaragua's election a 'pantomime' that's 'neither free nor fair'
US President Joe Biden on Sunday slammed Nicaraguan presidential elections as a "sham," as incumbent Daniel Ortega was assured to win after sidelining his challengers. Mr Ortega has secured around 75% of the vote.
"What Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, orchestrated today was a pantomime election that was neither free nor fair, and most certainly not democratic," Biden said in a White House statement on "Nicaragua's sham elections."
Ortega's regime "rigged the outcome well before election day" by imprisoning 39 opposition figures, including seven would-be presidential challengers in recent months and "blocking political parties."
Biden also hit out at the Nicaraguan leader for having quashed and "bullied" the independent media, the private sector and civil society.
"Long unpopular and now without a democratic mandate, the Ortega and Murillo family now rule Nicaragua as autocrats," Biden said.
Preliminary results from the Nicaraguan general election suggest that incumbent President Daniel Ortega has won by a landslide.
Mr Ortega has secured around 75% of the vote.
