Nicaragua's parliament on Wednesday passed a law to imprison people who spread "alarm" on social media, a measure opponents say will be used to punish authors of posts critical of the regime.

The law outlines prison sentences of up to five years and fines for people who publish messages that cause "alarm" or "fear," a statement from parliament said, with most of its members loyal to strongman Daniel Ortega, who is accused of rights abuses.

For publications that are considered to promote discrimination, hate or violence, or those that endanger social and economic stability, the penalty can be up to 10 years.

Dubbed a "gag law" by opposition media in exile, the regulation updates 2020 legislation against cyber crimes that has led to the arrest of many government opponents accused of "propagation of fake news."

The law "strengthens the prevention, confrontation, investigation and prosecution of crimes committed by natural or legal persons inside or outside the country through computer systems, new technologies and social networks," the statement said.

It can also target anyone who "facilitates" these crimes, whether they be Nicaraguan or not.

The new law would, in effect, ensure "total control (by the authorities) over social networks," Nicaraguan lawyer Salvador Marenco, exiled in Costa Rica, told AFP.

"Social networks were fundamental for the denunciation of serious human rights violations" in Nicaragua, said Marenco, adding the law was an extension of Ortega’s "policy of transnational repression."

Approval of the law, which will go into effect once published in the government gazette, came just days after another piece of legislation was passed that allows for prison sentences of up to 30 years for Nicaraguans at home or abroad who commit "offenses against the state."

That law, the UN said, "could be used to intensify persecution and repression against Nicaraguans, including those in exile."

Ortega's government has increasingly targeted critics, shutting down more than 5,500 NGOs, since 2018 mass protests in which the UN estimates some 300 people died.

Thousands of Nicaraguans have fled into exile since then, and Ortega's government is under US and EU sanctions.

On Tuesday, Ortega's government revoked the citizenship and seized the property of 135 people freed from Nicaraguan prisons and flown to Guatemala in a deal negotiated by the United States.

That brought to 451 the number of exiled opposition members who have been stripped of their citizenship since the beginning of 2023, according to an AFP count based on official data.

Ortega became the leader of Nicaragua first as a junta head in 1979, after fighting as a guerrilla in the Sandinista movement that toppled the US-backed Somoza family dictatorship.

He was later elected president in 1985.

Beaten in elections in 1990, he returned to power in 2007 and has since quashed presidential term limits and seized control of all branches of the state.

The Geneva-based UN human rights office (OHCHR) in its annual report on Nicaragua warned last week of a "serious" deterioration in human rights under Ortega.

The report cited violations such as arbitrary arrests of opponents, torture, ill-treatment in detention, increased violence against Indigenous people and attacks on religious freedom.