Expresses profound concern at the dramatic increase in the number of civil society organizations, universities and independent media outlets, including those working with groups in vulnerable situations such as Indigenous Peoples, Afrodescendants, women, children and adolescents, that have been forced to cease their activities owing to unduly restrictive administrative and financial constraints imposed by the legal reforms passed since 2018, and at the arbitrary cancellation of their legal registration and the impact such closures have on independent human rights monitoring and the enjoyment of human rights, online and offline, especially the rights to freedom of opinion, of expression, of association and of peaceful assembly, to privacy and to education, as set out in articles 12, 19, 20 and 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, articles 17, 19 and 21 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and urges the Government of Nicaragua to restore the legal registration of civil society organizations, universities and independent media outlets that have been cancelled since 2018, to restore the independence and academic freedom of the private universities that have been placed under government control and that of the public universities that have been stripped of their autonomy, to return arbitrarily seized assets, including confiscated property, and to allow for the continuation of their work without any type of intimidation, threat or reprisal;
