Barrio Largaespada, Hospital Bautista 1c Oeste 1c Norte, Managua, Nicaragua

Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury (Treasury) Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated the Nicaraguan mining authority General Directorate of Mines (DGM) as well as one official of the Government of Nicaragua, pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13851. DGM is a subordinate office within the Nicaraguan Ministry of Energy and Mines (MEM). Since the June 2022 designation of Empresas Nicaraguenses de Minas (ENIMINAS), DGM has managed most mining operations in Nicaragua on behalf of the Nicaraguan government. As such, DGM is an important piece of state-controlled gold operations in Nicaragua. Ortega and his cronies continue to use proceeds derived from the production and sale of gold to line their own pockets and to pay off those who keep the regime in power. The regime has used this power to intimidate and jail those that speak out about the regime’s corruption and to sow instability around the world, including by supporting Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine. By designating DGM, Treasury aims to cut off the Ortega-Murillo regime from its ability to use gold proceeds to oppress the Nicaraguan people. DGM is being designated for being owned or controlled by, or having acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, Salvador Mansell Castrillo, who is the Nicaraguan Minister of Energy and Mines and whose property and interests in property were blocked pursuant to E.O. 13851 on November 15, 2021. Today, OFAC also issued Nicaragua General License (GL) 4, which provides a time-limited authorization allowing U.S. persons to wind down transactions involving DGM. OFAC also issued associated guidance noting that foreign persons generally do not risk sanctions for engaging in activities that would be authorized by GL 4.

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1046

2022-10-24

US

Executive Order 13851 of November 27, 2018 Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Situation in Nicaragua

OFAC country specific

Nicaragua

Blocking Property, Suspending Entry

• https://ofac.treasury.gov/faqs/topic/2581

On November 27, 2018, the President, invoking the authority of, inter alia, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701–1706) (IEEPA), issued Executive Order 13851 (83 FR 61505, November 29, 2018) (E.O. 13851). In E.O. 13851, the President determined that the situation in Nicaragua, including the violent response by the Government of Nicaragua to the protests that began on April 18, 2018, and the Ortega regime's systematic dismantling and undermining of democratic institutions and the rule of law, its use of indiscriminate violence and repressive tactics against civilians, and its corruption leading to the destabilization of Nicaragua's economy, constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, and declared a national emergency to deal with that threat.