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Saddam Hussein ordered Iraq's central bank to withdraw $1 billion for his youngest son the day before the invasion to stop it falling into foreign hands, according to a leaked letter apparently written by the former dictator. In a hand-written note to the bank's governor, marked "top secret" and dated March 19, 2003, the former president told Isam Huwaish to give $920 million and 90 million euros to his son Qusay and another man, al-Mashriq newspaper reported yesterday. The Iraqi national broadsheet reproduced the letter, which appears to bear Saddam's signature. Saddam sent bank a hand-written note Employees of the...

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen won't let go of the mystery: Just where did the Cuban government get up to $3.9 billion it funneled through a Swiss bank over seven years. Was Havana simply, as it claims, banking its income from tourism and remittances that Cubans abroad send to their relatives on the island? Or was dirty money involved? Ros-Lehtinen, the Cuban-born Florida Republican, wants to know, and she has been badgering officials of the United Bank of Switzerland (UBS) and the U.S. Federal Reserve for answers. ''That's an awful lot of money,'' Ros-Lehtinen told The Herald. According to the latest answers...

BERN, Switzerland - The United States believes it has found at least $300 million Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) hid in banks, yet doesn't have enough evidence to get countries such as Syria and Switzerland to hand over the money, U.S. and European officials told The Associated Press. The funds at stake could go to the Iraq (news - web sites) insurgency or the country's reconstruction — depending on who gets it first. What troubles investigators more is that much of Saddam's cash may already be gone. The weak U.S. intelligence and the slow-moving investigation, now in its 11th...