Nicaragua to invite rights groups to probe deadly unrest

Managua (AFP) – Nicaragua’s influential bishops said late Friday that rival government and civil delegates had agreed to create a truth commission and invite independent international bodies to probe the violence that has left at least 170 people dead.

The shock announcement that President Daniel Ortega’s administration and anti-government groups had reached consensus to let human rights investigators in came after a morning round of talks ended in apparent impasse.

The Central American country was also to “create a verification and security commission, which will be accompanied by the IACHR, the UN and the European Union, always with the Catholic Church as witnesses and mediators,” Cardinal Leopoldo Brenes said.