Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the geographically largest country in Central America, comprising 130,370 km2 (50,340 sq mi). With a population of 7,142,529 as of 2024, it is the third-most populous country in Central America after Guatemala and Honduras.
Nicaragua is a nation in Central America. It is located about midway between Mexico and Colombia, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. Nicaragua ranges from the Caribbean Sea on the nation's east coast, and the Pacific Ocean bordering the west. Nicaragua also possesses a series of islands and cays located in the Caribbean Sea.
According to the 2022 revision of the World Population Prospects, Nicaragua has a population of 6,850,540..According to a 2014 research published in the journal Genetics and Molecular Biology, European ancestry predominates in 69% of Nicaraguans, followed by African ancestry in 20%, and lastly indigenous ancestry in 11%. A Japanese research of "Genomic Components in America's demography" demonstrated that, on average, the ancestry of Nicaraguans is 58–62% European, 28% Native American, and 14% African, with a very small Near Eastern contribution. Non-genetic data from the CIA World Factbook establish that from Nicaragua's 2016 population of 5,966,798, around 69% are mestizo, 17% white, 5% Native American, and 9% black and other races. This fluctuates with changes in migration patterns. The population is 58% urban as of 2013.
The Sandinista National Liberation Front is a Christian socialist political party in Nicaragua. Its members are called Sandinistas in both English and Spanish. The party is named after Augusto César Sandino, who led the Nicaraguan resistance against the United States occupation of Nicaragua in the 1930s.
Managua is the capital and largest city of Nicaragua, and one of the largest cities in Central America. Located on the shores of Lake Managua, the city had an estimated population of 1,055,247 as of 2020, and a population of 1,401,687 in its metropolitan area. The city also serves as the seat of Managua Department.
Anastasio Somoza García was the leader of Nicaragua from 1936 until his assassination in 1956. He was officially the 21st President of Nicaragua from 1 January 1937 to 1 May 1947 and from 21 May 1950 until his assassination on 29 September 1956, ruling for the rest of the time as an unelected military dictator. He was the patriarch of the Somoza family, which ruled Nicaragua as a family dictatorship for 42 years.
The Nicaraguan Revolution began with rising opposition to the Somoza dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s, the ouster of the dictatorship in 1978–79, and fighting between the government and the Contras from 1981 to 1990. The revolution revealed the country as one of the major proxy war battlegrounds of the Cold War.
Jinotega is the capital city of the Department of Jinotega in north-central Nicaragua.
The NicaraguanNational Guard was a militia and a gendarmerie created in 1925 during the occupation of Nicaragua by the United States. It became notorious for human rights abuses and corruption under the regime of the Somoza family (1936–1979). The National Guard was disbanded when the Sandinistas came to power in 1979.
Carlos Fonseca Amador was a Nicaraguan professor, politician, writer and revolutionary who was one of the founders of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). Fonseca was later killed in the mountains of the Zelaya Department, Nicaragua, three years before the FSLN took power. He has posthumously received the titles of National Hero of Nicaragua and Commander in Chief of the Sandinista Popular Revolution.
La Prensa is a Nicaraguan newspaper, with offices in the capital Managua. Its current daily circulation is placed at 42,000. Founded in 1926, in 1932 it was bought by Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Zelaya, who had become editor-in-chief. He promoted the Conservative Party of Nicaragua and became a voice of opposition to Juan Bautista Sacasa, for which the paper was censored. He continued to be critical of dictator Anastasio Somoza García, who came to power in a coup d'état.
Matagalpa is a city in Nicaragua which is the capital of the department of Matagalpa. The city has a population of 112,697, while the population of the department is 606,643. Matagalpa is Nicaragua's seventh largest city, the largest in the country's interior, and one of the most commercially active outside of Managua. Matagalpa is known as the "Pearl of the North" and "Land of Eternal Spring."
Rigoberto López Pérez was a Nicaraguan poet, artist and composer. He assassinated Anastasio Somoza García, the longtime dictator of Nicaragua.
Nicaragua's economic history has shifted from concentration in gold, beef, and coffee to a mixed economy under the Sandinista government to an International Monetary Fund policy attempt in 1990.
Tomás Borge Martínez, often spelled as Thomas Borge in American newspapers, was a cofounder of the Sandinista National Liberation Front in Nicaragua and was Interior Minister of Nicaragua during one of the administrations of Daniel Ortega. He was also a renowned statesman, writer, and politician. Tomás Borge also held the titles of "Vice-Secretary and President of the FSLN", member of the Nicaraguan Parliament and National Congress, and Ambassador to Peru. Considered a hardliner, he led the "prolonged people's war" tendency within the FSLN until his death.
The following is an alphabetical list of topics related to Nicaragua.
The history of the Jews in Nicaragua dates back to the 1400s. Jewish Nicaraguans or Nicaraguan Jews are Nicaraguans of Jewish ancestry who were born in or have immigrated to Nicaragua. They are part of the ethnic Jewish diaspora.
Sofía Montenegro Alarcón is a Nicaraguan journalist, social researcher, and feminist. Montenegro's family were militarily aligned with the Somoza forces, but her feminist and Marxist studies moved her to join with the opposition to the regime. She fought in the Sandinista Revolution and though initially supportive of the Sandinista Party, later became an outspoken critic, saying it had moved to the right. She served as an editor of various divisions of the official Sandinista newspaper, Barricada, until 1994, when she founded the Center for Communication Research (CINCO) as an independent research organization free of government influence. She has written broadly on power, gender, and social interaction.
The 2018 Nicaraguan protests began on 18 April 2018 following a move by the government of Daniel Ortega to reform social security. Following the deaths of protesters, demonstrations intensified and grew into a large anti-Ortega movement seeking his removal from office.
Rolando José Álvarez Lagos is a Nicaraguan prelate of the Catholic Church. He has served as the Bishop of Matagalpa since 2011 and apostolic administrator of Estelí since 2021. He is a longtime opponent of the Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. In February 2023, after being held under house arrest for six months, he refused to join a group of political prisoners released into U.S. custody and was sentenced for treason to 26 years in prison. He was exiled to Vatican City in January 2024.
