CIVIL WAR: This Is What It Looks like on the Front Lines of the Nicaraguan Protests

A surge of violence has snuffed out economic activity and dimmed prospects to peacefully resolve a political crisis here that began as a protest against tax increases and turned into a revolt against Nicaragua’s longtime leader Daniel Ortega.



Since mid-April, more than 100 people have been killed in confrontations with police during mass protests and what human-rights groups say are paramilitary gangs aligned with Mr. Ortega’s government.



Among them were 15 people killed at a peaceful Mother’s Day protest march last month in Managua and 11 people by paramilitary groups and police in the predominantly indigenous city of Masaya this past weekend, including a 15-year-old protester who witnesses say was executed by a policewoman.



On Tuesday, violence flared in the quaint colonial city of Granada, home to hundreds of American retirees.



“We are going through very dark days,” said Humberto Belli, a former education minister. “The people are out in the street demanding that Ortega leave, but he has shown an unexpected ability to kill. We see more blood every day—three, four, five people killed on a daily basis. This has no end.”