Iraq launches new currency

Iraq has launched a new currency as US-backed authorities work to stabilise the country.

The new dinar became legal tender with the opening of banks this morning.

Iraqis will have three months to swap the currency from ousted regime for the new money, which comes in six denominations: 50, 250, 1,000, 5,000, 10,000 and 25,000 dinars.

The new notes have been flown in from their printing plant in Britain and were distributed to banks across Iraq in US armoured trucks, as the central bank began burning the old currency.

They are the same value as the old notes, trading at about 2,000 dinars to the US dollar (€0.85), and have state-of-the-art anti-counterfeit features.

They are to unify the currency in Iraq, where the pre-1991 Swiss Dinar is still in circulation in the Kurdish areas of the north.

Money supply is expected to be much tighter than during Saddam's days, when currency was overprinted.

US commerce secretary Donald Evans is due to attend a ceremony later today to mark the launching of the currency.