Post date: Nov 22, 2011 12:34:23 PM
A French court is expected to give the green light for the extradition of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, who should be extradited to Panama 22 years after surrendering to American agents during the U.S.'s 1989 invasion.
PARIS, FRANCE (NOVEMBER 21, 2011) (REUTERS) - A French court is expected on Wednesday (November 22) to pave the way for the extradition of Panamanian former dictator Manuel Noriega to his home country where he faces the prospect of a further stint in jail.
Noriega, now 77, has been in prison in Paris since April 2010 serving a sentence for money laundering after his transfer from a U.S. prison where he spent a 20-year stretch for drug trafficking, money laundering and racketeering.
Last summer France accepted extradition to Panama for a first case of murder.
On Wednesday the court is set to decide whether the conditions have been met for a second extradition request filed by Panama relating to separate criminal charges, which would give the green light for the former dictator to be extradited to Panama to serve further sentences there.
"He's charged with several counts of murder back in his country and he will have to face such charges and maybe more generally he will have the tribunal of history, being the former head of state of Panama and it is definitely what he is willing to do right now," Noriega's lawyer Antonin Levy said on Tuesday (November 22).
The date for the actual departure has yet to be determined. His lawyer says Noriega is keen to return to Panama as soon as possible.
"Yes I think there is no legal advantage for him but maybe the main advantage is from a human perspective. He's coming back to his home country, the one where he is coming from and he is coming to his family to everything he ever was. So he's been detained for 20 years in countries in which he has no relatives at all and he just wants go back home," Levy told Reuters Television.
Panamanian media have reported that special cells have been prepared for him at a penitentiary near Panama City. A law in Panama lets prisoners above the age of 70 serve sentences under house arrest, although this is subject to a judge's approval.
Born in Panama in January, 1934, Noriega never knew his father and was raised by a maternal aunt in Panama City's rundown San Felipe district, less than a mile from the U.S.-controlled Canal Zone. He was a graduate of the U.S. School of the Americas -- dubbed by rights groups "a finishing school for dictators."
Extensive scars to his face from a severe case of adolescent acne led to opponents giving him the derisive nickname of "Cara de Pina" (Spanish for "Pineapple Face"). He was feared as street-smart and ruthless.
As leader of the National Guard's intelligence unit, G2, under military leader Omar Torrijos, Noriega orchestrated the "disappearance" of the regime's opponents. After Torrijos was killed in an air crash in 1981, Noriega began manoeuvring for power and became the effective ruler of Panama two years later, promoting himself to general.
A paid CIA collaborator since the early 1970s, Noriega initially worked closely with Washington, allowing U.S. forces to set up electronic listening posts in Panama and use the country as a conduit for covert aid to pro-American forces in El Salvador and Nicaragua.
He fell out with Washington after dismissing Nicholas Adroit Bartlett, Panama's first directly elected president in 16 years, and dabbling in geopolitical intrigues. He lent covert support to embargoed Cuban leader Fidel Castro and Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and became increasingly involved with the Medellin drug cartel, receiving multi-million-dollar kickbacks.
In February 1988, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration had Noriega indicted on federal drugs charges relating to cocaine trafficking and money laundering. The following year Noriega nullified the results of a general election and had opposition candidates beaten. On December 15, 1989 the Noriega-controlled National Assembly declared the United States and Panama to be in a "state of war."
Five days later, then-U.S. President George Bush sent U.S. forces into Panama accusing Noriega of provoking a confrontation with U.S. Canal Zone forces, fatally shooting one American soldier. In an address to the U.S., Bush said that under Noriega's direction, Panamanian troops had wounded another American serviceman, detained and assaulted a third American and "brutally interrogated" his wife.
On 20th December 1989, 27,000 U.S. troops seized control of Panama City in "Operation Just Cause," razing the army's headquarters and launching a house-to-house search for Noriega. He surrendered in January 1990 after holing up in the Vatican Embassy, unable to withstand an assault of loud rock music that Americans blasted at the mission night and day.