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December 29, 2014

Cuba Rejects Calls to Extradite Assata Shakur to U.S. 
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Cuba has rejected calls to extradite exiled Black Panther Assata Shakur
back to the United States following the historic resumption of
diplomatic ties. Shakur was convicted of killing a state trooper in 1973
after being pulled over on the New Jersey Turnpike. The encounter left
both the officer and a fellow Black Panther dead. Shakur has said she
was shot by police with both arms in the air, and then again from the
back. She was sentenced to life in prison but managed to escape and flee
to Cuba, where she has lived since 1984. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie
has called on President Obama to demand Shakur's extradition. But in a
statement, Cuba's Foreign Ministry said the two countries do not have an
extradition treaty and political asylum is not up for negotiation,
saying: "Every nation has sovereign and legitimate rights to grant
political asylum to people it considers to have been persecuted."

 

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