SAN JOS, Jan 24, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - The Inter-American Court of Human Rights on Thursday condemned Nicaragua for allowing President Daniel Ortega's re-election in 2011, despite a constitutional ban due to term limits.

Ortega won the election with 62 percent of the vote, against 31 percent for opponent Fabio Gadea Mantilla.

The Costa Rica-based court found the Nicaraguan state responsible for "the violation of the political rights, guarantees" and "judicial protections" of Gadea Mantilla in the election, president Nancy Hernandez said.

Ortega, who had already served two terms, (1985-1990 and 2007-2012), was not eligible under the constitution to run again.

But the Supreme Court, dominated by judges considered supportive of the government, ruled in 2009 that the ban did not apply in his case.

State institutions "tried to give an appearance of legality to the decision that authorized the re-election" of Ortega, who benefited from a "lack of integrity of the electoral process," Hernandez said.

The 79-year-old former guerrilla, who was also re-elected in contested elections in 2016 and 2021, is accused by human rights organizations of establishing an autocracy in Nicaragua.

Thousands of Nicaraguans have gone into exile and some 450 politicians, entrepreneurs, intellectuals and artists have been stripped of their nationality in recent years for alleged "treason."