Rosa Adelina Barahona Castro (born 10 May 1957) is a Nicaraguan psychologist and politician who has been the country's Minister of Defence since August 2019.
Barahona Castro was born in Murra, Nueva Segovia on 10 May 1957. [1] [2] She attended the NS Mixed School Center from 1965 until 1969, and then Immaculate Conception School, both in Ocotal. [2] She has a degree in psychology from the Central American University in Managua. [2]
Barahona Castro was a founding member of the Sandinista Popular Army in 1979 and served as head of the Juana Elena Mondoza Women's Company in Esteli, as well as head of the Registration and Control section. [2] She retired in 1992 with the rank of captain. [2] She briefly worked as an independent consultant before taking on a number of roles in the Foundation for Women and Community Economic Development (FUMDEC) including Manager of the Organization and Gender Program from 1997, and Executive Director from 1998 to 2012. [2]
Barahona Castro is a member of the ruling Sandinista National Liberation Front, [3] and on the party's board of directors. [4] She has been member of the National Assembly representing Matagalpa since 2012, after the disputed re-election of Daniel Ortega. [5] She was Deputy FSLN Bank Owner for two legislative periods, from 2012 to 2019. [2] During her time in the Assembly, she did not personally present any bills, but supported FSLN initiatives including Amnesty, reform of the electoral Law and amendments to the Constitution. [5] She was vice president of the Health and Social Security Commission. [6]
Barahona Castro was appointed Minister of Defence by President Ortega on August 19, 2019, replacing Martha Elena Ruiz Sevilla. [7]
As an official of the Government of Nicaragua, Barahona Castro has been officially sanctioned by the United States Department of the Treasury [1] for refusing "to disarm and dismantle" and providing weapons to "the parapolice that committed acts of violence against Nicaraguans." [4] She is a signatory to the manifesto "In defence of Nicaragua, which accuses the US and European countries of a "ruthless campaign of lies and blackmail" against Ortega. [6]
Castro is married. [2]
José Daniel Ortega Saavedra is a Nicaraguan politician and the 58th president of Nicaragua since 2007. Previously, he was leader of Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990, first as Coordinator of the Junta of National Reconstruction from 1979 to 1985, and then as the 54th President from 1985 to 1990. During his first term, he implemented policies to achieve leftist reforms across Nicaragua. In later years, Ortega's left-wing radical politics cooled significantly, leading him to pursue pro-business policies and even rapprochement with the Catholic Church. However, in 2022, Ortega resumed repression of the Church, and has imprisoned prelate Rolando José Álvarez Lagos.
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.
Gioconda Belli is a Nicaraguan-born novelist and poet known for her contributions to Nicaraguan literature.
The Junta of National Reconstruction was the provisional government of Nicaragua from the fall of the Somoza dictatorship in July 1979 until January 1985, with the election of Sandinista National Liberation Front’s Daniel Ortega as president.
General elections were held in Nicaragua on 5 November 2006. The country's voters went to the polls to elect a new President of the Republic and 90 members of the National Assembly. Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) was elected president with 38% of the vote, defeating Eduardo Montealegre with 28%, José Rizo with 27%, Edmundo Jarquín with 6%, and Edén Pastora with 0.3%. The FSLN also emerged as the largest party in the National Assembly, winning 38 seats.
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 Sandinista Renovation Movement is a Nicaraguan political party founded on 21 May 1995. It defines itself as a democratic and progressive party, made of people of all genders, that promotes the construction of a Nicaragua with opportunities, progress, solidarity, democracy, and sovereignty.
Dora María Téllez Argüello is a Nicaraguan historian known for her involvement in the Nicaraguan Revolution. As a young university medical student in León in the 1970s, Téllez was recruited by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). Téllez went on to become a comandante and fought alongside later president Daniel Ortega in the revolution that ousted dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle in 1979. In the subsequent FSLN government, she served as Health Minister under Ortega and has also been an advocate for women's rights. She ultimately became a critic of repression and corruption under President Ortega and left the FSLN in 1995 to found the party Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS), later renamed Unamos. Along with several other opposition figures, she was arrested in June 2021 by the Ortega government.
Rosario María Murillo Zambrana is a Nicaraguan politician and poet who is the Vice President of Nicaragua, the country's second highest office, since January 2017 and First Lady of Nicaragua since 2007 and from 1985 to 1990 as the wife of President Daniel Ortega. Murillo has served as the Nicaraguan government's lead spokesperson, government minister, head of the Sandinista Association of Cultural Workers, and Communications Coordinator of the Council on Communication and Citizenry. She was sworn in as vice president of Nicaragua on 10 January 2017. In August 2021, she was personally sanctioned by the European Union, over alleged human rights violations.
General elections were held in Nicaragua on 25 February 1990 to elect the President and the members of the National Assembly. The result was a victory for the National Opposition Union (UNO), whose presidential candidate Violeta Chamorro surprisingly defeated incumbent president Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). This led to a historic peaceful and democratic transfer of power in Nicaragua.
In 1979, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) overthrew Anastasio Somoza Debayle, ending the Somoza dynasty, and established a revolutionary government in Nicaragua. Following their seizure of power, the Sandinistas ruled the country first as part of a Junta of National Reconstruction. Following the resignation of centrist members from this Junta, the FSLN took exclusive power in March 1981.
General elections were held in Nicaragua on 6 November 2011. The incumbent president Daniel Ortega, won a third term in this election, with a landslide victory.
Martha Elena Ruiz Sevilla is a Nicaraguan politician and lawyer who has served as Minister of Defence from 2013 to 2019.
Luis Fernando Carrión Cruz is Nicaraguan politician. He is a former guerilla and one of the nine commandantes of the Sandinista (FSLN) National Directorate that overthrew the Somoza regime in 1979. Born to a wealthy, politically-connected family, he began college in the United States but returned to Nicaragua, first joining a radical Catholic group then the FSLN. He led the Carlos Roberto Huembes Eastern Front in Chontales during the final offensive of the revolution. He was a government minister and member of the FSLN National Directorate until 1995 when he split with party and became a cofounder of the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS).
Leticia Herrera Sánchez is a Nicaraguan politician and former guerrilla leader. She was one of the first women commanders of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) against the dictatorial government of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua from 1974 to 1979.
Vilma Núñez de Escorcia is a Nicaraguan lawyer and human-rights activist. Born to a single mother, she developed an early concern for social justice. As an undergraduate studying law at National Autonomous University of Nicaragua in León, she met future senior government officials Carlos Tünnerman and Sergio Ramírez, and became one of the survivors of the 23 July 1959 student massacre by the Somoza National Guard. She joined the Sandinista National Liberation Front around 1975 and in 1979 was imprisoned and tortured by the Somoza regime. She was freed days before the FSLN insurrection succeeded on 19 July 1979. When they took power, she served as vice-president of the Supreme Court of Justice, then as director of the National Commission for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights.
Hugo Torres Jiménez was a Nicaraguan Sandinista guerrilla and military leader who was a brigadier general in the Nicaraguan Armed Forces. During the Sandinista National Liberation Front effort to overthrow the Somoza family regime, Torres was the only guerrilla who participated in both the 1974 Christmas party raid that freed future President Daniel Ortega among other prisoners, and the 1978 raid on the National Palace, freeing another 60 political prisoners. In the late 1990s he became a critic of Ortega, leaving the FSLN to join the Sandinista Renovation Movement and later its successor the Democratic Renewal Union, serving as vice-president of both parties. In June 2021 he was part of a wave of arrests of opposition figures by the Ortega administration. He died the following February.
Victor Hugo Tinoco Fonseca is a Nicaraguan politician and former Sandinista guerilla. He was Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs with the Sandinista National Liberation Front, ambassador to the United Nations and a deputy in the National Assembly. In the late 1990s he grew critical of Daniel Ortega and was expelled from the party in 2005, joining the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS) instead and later its successor, the Democratic Renewal Union (Unamos) party. In June 2021, he was part of a wave of arrests of opposition figures, including seven aspiring opposition candidates for president in the 2021 Nicaraguan general election.
Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Barrios is a Nicaraguan journalist and politician. He began his career in journalism working at La Prensa, following the 1978 assassination of its editor, his father, Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal. Working on the side of the Contras in exile in the 1980s, he returned to the country in 1989 when his mother Violeta Barrios de Chamorro ran for president, and following her election, served as a Nicaraguan ambassador. He later became defense minister. In the 21st century, Chamorro has been a city councilor for Managua and deputy in the National Assembly, also for Managua. On 25 June 2021, he became part of a wave of arrests of opposition and civic figures in Nicaragua.
Suyén Barahona Cuan is a Nicaraguan activist. She is president of the Democratic Renewal Union party (Unamos), an opposition group that is the successor to the Sandinista Renovation Movement. She is also a member of the Blue and White National Unity opposition group that formed following the outbreak of anti-government protests in April 2018. In June 2021, she was arrested alongside other opposition figures and pre-candidates for president in the 2021 Nicaraguan general election.