AMERICA’S Defence Department is unable to account for about 95% of $9 billion (€6.9bn) supposedly spent on rebuilding the war-shattered country.

The former chief of the Iraq oil-for-food programme has resigned – just a day before investigators release a report that is expected to accuse him of taking kickbacks under the $64bn (€51.8bn) humanitarian operation.

A FIREFIGHT erupted when US forces surrounded the home of a cousin of Saddam Hussein in the northern city of Mosul yesterday, apparently searching for the deposed dictator’s sons. The building later burned to the ground.