He had challenged his extradition to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the highest court let stand a ruling by a federal appeals court that the U.S. government can legally send Noriega to France without violating his rights as a prisoner of war.

The U.S. appeals court had rejected Noriega's claim that his extradition would violate his rights under the Geneva Conventions, which govern the treatment of prisoners of war.

The U.S. government has supported France's extradition request and said the Geneva Conventions do not apply to Noriega's case.....

Noriega's French legal team plans to argue that his alleged crimes took place when he was a head of state and he should have immunity from prosecution, said one of Noriega's two lawyers in France, Yves Leberquier.

They will also contend that a statute of limitations meant he could no longer be prosecuted and that the statute granted to him in the United States as a prisoner of war would need to be respected in France, Leberquier told France Info radio.

After Hoeveler ruled against Noriega, the lawyers filed a renewed petition, claiming France would not grant the general the PoW status to which they say he is entitled.

The judge rejected the petition on Friday, saying he was satisfied with US assurances that France would give Noriega the same treatment he was afforded in the United States, even though Paris does not consider him a PoW.....

....While Panama has called for Noriega's repatriation, it did not take legal action to block the French extradition request.

In court documents, the lawyers suggested France may have agreed to take Noriega off the Central American country's hands "as a quid pro quo for a $300m contract to sell high-speed trains to Panama".

al jazeera

Well clearly he is not getting the same treatment in his dingy Paris cell. Far different from the Presidential suite he had in FL.

And the bit about quid pro quo, wow.  Oh, and Scalia and Thomas evidentially dissented when the SC turned down his French Extradition appeal.

From Jan 2010, SC Won't Halt Extradition

Although Noriega is the only official prisoner of war currently in US custody, his appeal sought an examination of the constitutionality of legal provisions passed by Congress to undercut appeals on behalf of terrorism suspects at the Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, detention camp.

In answering Noriega's appeal, the US solicitor general's office cited the 2006 Military Commissions Act, which the government argued precludes a person detained as a POW from invoking the Geneva Conventions as a source of rights in a lawsuit challenging the legality of the POW's detention.

In his dissent, Justice Thomas said the high court should examine the issues raised by Noriega. He said any resulting opinion would provide much-needed guidance to the lower courts in cases involving Al Qaeda suspects.

Issues raised in the appeal include whether the 2006 Military Commission Act, as enforced against Noriega, resulted in an unconstitutional suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. The appeal also questioned whether the protections of the Geneva Conventions can be invoked by an individual POW and whether those protections may be enforced by US judges.

"It is incumbent upon us to provide what guidance we can on these issues now," Thomas wrote in a 15-page dissent. "Whatever conclusion we reach, our opinion will help the political branches and the courts discharge their responsibilities over detainee cases, and will spare detainees and the government years of unnecessary litigation."

The high court rejected Noriega's appeal in a one-line order without explanation. No other justices wrote about the Noriega case....

"The Prisoner of War Convention requires the immediate return home of prisoners of war at the end of hostilities subject to completion of any sentence imposed for crimes prosecuted by the detaining power," wrote Miami lawyer Jon May in his brief on behalf of Noriega. "Only in the case of war criminals is any exception permitted."

Not so, countered Solicitor General Elena Kagan in her brief. "The Third Geneva Convention does not prohibit the extradition of a prisoner of war to face criminal charges in another country," she wrote. "[Noriega's] challenges to that conclusion lack merit."

Ms. Kagan said the conventions permit a detaining country to transfer a POW to another country to face pending criminal charges once the detaining country is satisfied that the receiving country will abide by the Geneva Conventions. She said these requirements have been satisfied by means of diplomatic communications between the US and France.

The solicitor general also cited the Military Commissions Act (MCA) as barring prisoners from invoking the Geneva Accords as a source of rights.

Congress intended that the Geneva Conventions not be judicially enforceable in any court in the US, she said.

Noriega's lawyers argued that the rights of "hundreds" of US prisoners were at risk. The government's interpretation of the MCA renders the statute unconstitutional, Mr. May said.