French court sentences Noriega to 7 years in prison

A court in the French capital Paris sentenced former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega on Wednesday to 7 years in prison for money laundering, DPA reported

Noriega was found guilty of hiding in French bank accounts some 3 million dollars made during the 1980s from the sale of cocaine connected to the infamous Medelin cartel of Colombia.

Noriega and his wife eventually used part of the money to purchase real estate in Paris.

In 1999, a French court had convicted him of the charges in absentia and sentenced him to 10 years in prison. The public prosecutor had demanded the same sentence in the latest trial.

Noriega, who is in his 70s, was extradited from the United States to France in late April. At the time, he demanded to be treated as a prisoner of war and returned to Panama to stand trial there on the charges.

"I have a right to everything that would be expected for a prisoner of war under the Geneva Convention, including a return to my home country after my imprisonment," he said at the time.

He also said that he was "a soldier, not a banker."

A French court rejected his request.

In this trial, the former dictator had charged that the case against him was "an imaginary financial set-up orchestrated by the United States."

Noriega spent 21 years in a US federal prison after being convicted on drug charges. He was captured in 1989 after an invasion of Panama by US military forces. dpa sm amh Author: