Spain Offers to Give Noriega Asylum

WASHINGTON — In a gesture to help resolve the Panamanian crisis, Spain has told the United States it would give asylum to Panama’s military strongman, Gen. Manuel A. Noriega, but Noriega so far has refused to go into exile, diplomatic sources said Saturday.

The sources said Jose Antonio Yanez, foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez, made the offer during three days of talks here last week with Panamanian opponents of Noriega and in a separate meeting with Elliott Abrams, U.S. assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs.

In his talk Friday with Abrams, Yanez is understood to have said that the offer depends on U.S. agreement not to seek Noriega’s extradition from Spain to face the drug-trafficking indictments returned against him last month by two federal grand juries in Florida.

Spain also has insisted that Washington make clear that any deal involving Noriega is not part of an effort to abrogate the Panama Canal Treaties, which will give Panama control over the canal in 1999.