A retired Nicaraguan military officer who later became a critic of President Daniel Ortega has been killed in a shooting at his condominium in Costa Rica, where he lives in exile.
The death of Roberto Samcam, 67, on Thursday has heightened concern about the safety of Nicaraguan dissidents, even when they live abroad.
Police in Costa Rica have confirmed that a suspect entered Samcam’s condominium building in the capital of San Jose at approximately 7:30am local time (13:30 GMT) and shot the retired major at least eight times.
Costa Rica’s Judicial Investigation Organisation identified the murder weapon as a 9mm pistol. Samcam’s wife, Claudia Vargas, told the Reuters news agency that the suspect pretended to be a delivery driver to gain access to her husband.
The suspect allegedly fired on Samcam and then left without saying a word, escaping on a motorcycle. He remains at large.
Samcam went into exile after participating in the 2018 protests, which began as demonstrations against social security reforms and escalated into one of the largest antigovernment movements in Nicaragua’s history.
Thousands of people flooded Nicaragua’s streets. Some even called for President Ortega’s resignation.
But while Ortega did ultimately cancel the social security reforms, he also answered the protests with a police crackdown, and the clashes killed an estimated 355 people, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
More than 2,000 people were injured, and another 2,000 held in what the IACHR described as “arbitrary detention”.
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