Mexico City: A Nicaraguan court has placed a Roman Catholic bishop under house arrest on charges of "conspiracy" and "spreading false news".

According to the government website L19 Digital, those crimes and "causing harm to the Nicaraguan government and society" were formally charged against Matagalpa Bishop Rolando Álvarez.

Lavrez's first hearing is scheduled for January 10. Additionally, a warrant was issued for a priest named Rev. Uriel Vallejos who, according to reports, had already left Nicaragua.

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Action Tuesday's expulsion of Sisters of Charity nuns from Mother Teresa's religious order marked the most recent episode in President Daniel Ortega's administration's campaign against the church.

The Vatican's top representative in Nicaragua, the papal nuncio, was expelled from the country in March. Since August, Bishop Alvarez has been under house arrest. Since 2018, when a wave of protests against Ortega's administration resulted in a widespread crackdown on opponents, he has been an important religious voice in discussions of Nicaragua's future.

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Last year, the Ortega administration detained several opposition leaders, including seven potential candidates for president. In speedy, secret trials this year, he was sentenced to life in prison. According to Ortega, the Catholic Church and foreign sponsors supported the pro-democracy demonstrations.

The Vatican resented the former Marxist guerrilla in the 1980s, but he gradually forged ties with the church when he made his bid to retake the presidency in 2007 after a lengthy absence.

However, Ortega claimed that the Catholic bishops of the Central American country had drafted a political resolution "on behalf of the terrorists, in the service of the Yankees" in 2018, just days before a presidential vote in which Ortega had won a fourth term in office. The bishops, he added, "were also terrorists."

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Pope Francis told a large crowd gathered in St Peter's Square in August that he was closely monitoring events in Nicaragua involving "individuals and institutions" with "concern and sadness". Custody was not mentioned by him.

"I want to express my firm belief and hope that through open and honest dialogue the foundations for a dignified and peaceful coexistence can still be found," the Pope said.