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Saddam took 1billion Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20030506/D7QS1K500.htmlhttp://apnews.excite.com/article/20030506/D7QS1K500.html
$1B Taken From Iraq Bank Still Missing
May 6, 4:24 PM (ET)
By JEANNINE AVERSA
WASHINGTON (AP) - Roughly $1 billion was taken from Iraq's Central Bank by Saddam Hussein and his family shortly before the United States began bombing Baghdad, the State Department said Tuesday.
Department spokesman Richard Boucher said he received the information from Treasury Department officials working in Iraq's capital. They are involved in efforts to help the country rebuild after the war.
Treasury Department officials, earlier in the day, said that roughly $900 million in U.S. currency was taken from the central bank at the onset of the war. But they didn't say who had taken the money, didn't know where it was and were still checking out details including the denomination of the missing currency.
"We do know from Treasury Department officials in Baghdad that approximately $1 billion was taken from the Iraqi Central Bank by Saddam Hussein and his family just prior to the start of combat operations," Boucher said. "At this point, I don't have any more details for you."
The New York Times reported that Saddam Hussein ordered the money taken from the Central Bank and sent his son Qusai in the middle of the night.
The amount of money - $900 million in U.S. $100 bills and $100 million in euros - was so large it had to be taken from the bank in three tractor trailers, the Times said.
"We are working to hunt down the assets that were stolen by the regime of Saddam Hussein. We will actively follow up on all of the leads," Boucher said.
Qusai, Saddam's younger son, and Abid al-Haimd Mahmood, Saddam's personal assistant, organized the removal of the cash, the Times report said, quoting an Iraqi banking official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The Iraqi official said the money amounted to a quarter of the central bank's currency reserves.
A U.S. Army Special Forces officer, Col. Ted Seel, said intelligence indicated that a convoy of tractor trailers crossed the border into Syria, but that the contents of the trucks were unknown, the Times report said.
U.S. Treasury official George Mullinax, who is assigned to help rebuild Iraq's banking system, told the newspaper it was possible that much of the money had already been recovered. He said the roughly $650 million found by U.S. forces in one of Saddam's palaces last month might have been from the central bank.
The Iraqi official, however, felt the money found in the palace belonged to Saddam's older son Odai, who he said was known for hoarding large sums of cash.
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