From the Iraqi Press Monitor (via the IraqCrisis list):
Saddam officials stole ancient artefacts
(Al-Nahdhah) � In an interview, Minister of Culture Mufeed al-Jazairi said officials of the former regime supervised digs at archaeological sites in order to steal statues, tablets, and many other relics and smuggle them abroad. A senior official in the department of heritage and relics said that Ali Hasan Majeed, nicknamed 'Chemical Ali', built a huge palace at the archaeological site of Al-Warid Hill, while Arshad Yaseen, Saddam's former bodyguard, smuggled a very precious handwritten copy of the Torah for a huge sum of money.
(Al-Nahdhah is issued thrice weekly by the Independent Democrats Movement.)
(My emphasis.) Smuggled it from where to where? Has it been recovered? More please!
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