Nicaraguan conspiracy court sentences five priests to ten years in prison

A Nicaraguan court sentenced four Roman Catholic priests to ten years in prison on conspiracy charges stemming from long-standing government claims that the church supported illegal pro-democracy protests.

A human rights organization in the Central American country quickly condemned the sentences handed down Monday and made public by Legal Defense Unit lawyers.

It was the latest chapter in President Daniel Ortega's church crackdown.

The priests were convicted in closed-door trials before government-appointed defenders.

Those sentenced on Monday had worked with Matagalpa Bishop Rolando Alvarez, and one had been rector of the privately run Juan Pablo II University in Managua.

Alvarez is being held under house arrest on conspiracy and "damaging the Nicaraguan government and society" charges, and he is scheduled to be sentenced soon.

On Monday, two seminary students and a diocese cameraman were also sentenced. All six defendants were arrested last year and were all stripped of their political office.

The sentences were described as a "legal aberration" by the Nicaraguan Human Rights Center.

“This is an insult to the law, an insult to people’s intelligence, an insult to the international community and the international agencies for the protection of human rights,”