Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni confirmed that the Holy See received 12 Nicaraguan priests after it accepted a request to take them from the Nicaraguan government.
He said the political prisoners “will be welcomed by an official of the Secretariat of State … and housed in some structures of the Diocese of Rome.”
News of the agreement was first announced in statement from the Nicaraguan government, with hard-left President Daniel Ortega (pictured) saying the priests would be flown to Rome within the week after what he described as productive talks with the Vatican.
A government statement said the 12 were flown out of the country following “fruitful conversations” with Catholic leaders in Nicaragua as well as with unnamed individuals in the Vatican.
The government statement said the agreement showed “the permanent will and commitment to find solutions” amid ongoing tensions between Church and state in Nicaragua, which have already seen the expulsion of the Jesuits earlier this year, as well as the ongoing detainment of Bishop Rolando Álvarez of Matagalpa.
Bishop Álvarez, who in February was sentenced to 26 years in prison shortly after Ortega exiled 222 prisoners to the United States, having refused to board the flight, was not among 12 priests sent to Rome.
Ortega’s regime has aggressively opposed the Catholic Church in recent years, insisting that church leaders backed mass protests against his administration in April 2018, which he has described as an attempted coup.
The President accused the Church of supporting the protests and waged a campaign against the clergy along with political dissidents and opponents and the free Press.
Earlier this year, it was reported that since 2018 the Nicaraguan regime has launched more than 500 attacks against the Catholic Church.
Martha Patricia Molina, a lawyer, said in a report called “Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church?” that there were at least 529 attacks perpetrated by the dictatorship in the last five years with more than 90 committed in the first four months of 2023.
In September, the United Nations-appointed Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua said the situation had worsened further, citing the erosion of academic freedom and the recent closure of Catholic universities.
Among the property and assets seized by the government was the Jesuit-run Central American University, which was taken over by the state in August on the grounds that it was functioning as a “centre of terrorism”.