For about a month now, anti-government protests have rocked Nicaragua.
Colonel Manuel Guevara, a military spokesman, told a news agency: “We think dialogue is the solution. We don’t have a reason to repress the protesters."
Referring to presence of soldiers in some cities, Guevara said: "We reject manipulated information that makes it seem that we are repressing the protests".
Nicaragua has been on edge since late last month, when President Daniel Ortega announced an overhaul of the nation’s welfare system, touching off violent protests.
After a violent crackdown by police, thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of the capital Managua to demand the resignation of Ortega, a former leftist guerrilla leader whom critics accuse of trying to build a family dictatorship.
On Friday, the United Nations human rights office said it had asked Nicaragua to let it enter the country to gather evidence about student deaths in the protests.
