PARIS (AP) — UNESCO on Sunday announced the withdrawal of Nicaragua from the U.N. cultural and educational body because of the awarding of a UNESCO prize celebrating press freedom to a Nicaraguan newspaper, La Prensa.
UNESCO’s director general, Audrey Azoulay, announced that she had received a letter Sunday morning from the Nicaraguan government announcing its withdrawal because of the attribution of the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize.
“I regret this decision, which will deprive the people of Nicaragua of the benefits of cooperation, particularly in the fields of education and culture. UNESCO is fully within its mandate when it defends freedom of expression and press freedom around the world,” Azoulay said in a statement.
Nicaragua was one of 194 member states in the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. UNESCO members set up the press freedom prize in 1997, and the 2025 award was attributed Saturday to La Prensa on the recommendation of an international jury of media professionals.
La Prensa was founded almost a century ago, in 1926, UNESCO noted.
It said that “since 2021, following the imprisonment and expulsion of its leaders from the country as well as the confiscation of its assets, La Prensa has continued to inform the Nicaraguan population online, with most of its team in exile and operating from Costa Rica, Spain, Mexico, Germany and the United States.”
In announcing their UNESCO withdrawal, Nicaraguan authorities accused La Prensa of promoting “military and political interventions by the United States in Nicaragua” and denounced the award of the prize as the “diabolical expression of a traitorous anti-patriotic sentiment,” UNESCO said.
Nicaragua’s angry departure is a blow for the organization that is also in the crosshairs of U.S. President Donald Trump.
In an executive order in February, Trump called for a review of American involvement in UNESCO. In his first term as president, the Trump administration in 2017 announced that the U.S. would withdraw from UNESCO, citing anti-Israel bias. That decision took effect a year later.
The United States formally rejoined UNESCO in 2023 after a five-year absence, under the presidency of Joe Biden.
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