LatinNews Daily - 19 May 2011

Panama: Following the rejection by a US judge on 7 September of an appeal that sought to block the extradition of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega to France, Noriega's lawyers filed an appeal with the US Circuit Court of Appeals in Miami. Such cases can take a year or 18 months to resolve, and on 9 September, the Federal Bureau of Prisons listed Noriega's projected release date as "unknown". Noriega completed his sentence for drug offences in the US on 9 September and was set to be extradited to France where he had been tried in absentia and given a 10-year sentence for money laundering.