Nicaragua is a Central American country that was ruled by the Somoza dynasty of dictators from the late 1930s until the Sandinista revolution in 1979. The Sandinistas then fought a decade-long war against right-wing contra rebels, who were backed illegally by the United States.
A peace agreement led to free elections in 1990, won by Violeta Chamorro with 55% of the vote. She inherited an economy with 40% unemployment and inflation above 13,000%. Her handover to Arnoldo Alemán was only the second time in Nicaragua's history that one elected president had succeeded another.
Daniel Ortega returned to power in 2007. He soon turned to repression. In 2018 the government used lethal force to put down widespread anti-government protests, killing at least 355 people. By 2021 he had locked up the main opposition candidates and secured re-election through a sham vote. In 2024 he overhauled the constitution, elevating his wife, Rosario Murillo, to "co-president". Ms Murillo, who had previously been his vice-president, is 74; Mr Ortega is 80. The new constitution reduced the courts and legislature to mere "organs of the state". The pair increased their control of the army and the police. Their sons took important posts in government.
Nicaragua has a population of around 7m. Some 800,000 Nicaraguans have left since 2019, according to Manuel Orozco of the Inter-American Dialogue, a think-tank in Washington—more than 10% of the population. Since 2023 the government has been stripping critics of citizenship and confiscating their property. Some emigrants discover they cannot return or renew their passports.
The regime has shut more than 5,500 NGOs. Almost 300 journalists have fled the country since 2018. University independence has been eliminated. Since 2022 more than 200 clergy have been jailed or forced to leave Nicaragua, including 18 nuns from Mother Teresa's charity. In 2025 the regime turned on fellow Sandinistas, placing Bayardo Arce, a former Sandinista commander and longtime economic adviser, under house arrest before convicting him of money-laundering and fraud. In 2025 the United Nations estimated that nearly a fifth of the population was hungry; the regime expelled UN representatives in response.
Growth has been solid at 3-4% a year since 2022, but rests on narrow foundations. Remittances, mostly from the United States, account for 30% of GDP, among the highest shares in the world. Exports, another big source of income, are also dependent on the United States.
The regime has drawn closer to China to reduce its dependence on America. After the United States put sanctions on the state mining company, Eniminas, the government rewrote concession rules. Chinese firms displaced Western ones and now hold concessions covering about 8% of the country's land, boosting gold exports and helping to evade sanctions.
On January 30th 2026 the State Department called Ms Murillo's position "illegitimate". The United States has stopped short of harsher measures, such as curbing American oil exports to the regime or severing banking ties. In January 2026 it declined to expel Nicaragua from the Central American Free-Trade Agreement, though it will gradually impose tariffs on Nicaraguan exports not covered by the agreement, reaching rates of 15% by 2028. On February 8th 2026 the regime ended visa-free entry for Cubans, which had facilitated migration northward towards the United States.
Nicaragua dreams of building a canal to rival the Panama Canal.
Nicaragua depends on subsidised oil from Venezuela. If Nicolás Maduro's regime falls, Nicaragua would probably lose access to that supply and be destabilised. In 2023 Nicaragua refused to sign the joint declaration at an EU-CELAC summit because of a (watered-down) condemnation of Russia's war against Ukraine.
Of course it's possible to love a human being if you don't know them too well.