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BASRAH – United States currency will soon become difficult to find in Iraq as efforts are underway to protect U.S. Soldiers and increase the value of the Iraqi dinar. Sgt. Brittany A. Raimer, a dispersing manager with the 368th Finance Management Company, out of Wichita, Kan., 36th Sustainment Brigade, 13th Sustainment Command (Expeditionary), said eliminating the use of U.S. currency on the battlefield will help to stimulate the economy of Iraq. "One of the main focuses of finance is to ultimately eliminate U.S. currency from the battlefield," said Raimer, a Lake Charles, La., native. "Our government is implementing the use...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 29, 2007 – Officials in Iraq's Kirkuk province are stepping up to invest more Iraqi money for funding reconstruction projects designed to provide a better future for residents, a U.S. State Department official said today. “We work very closely with the local government on their budget execution, and this is the spending of Iraqi dinars, not U.S. dollars, supporting projects all over the province,” Howard Keegan, the leader for the provincial reconstruction team in Kirkuk province, told Internet reporters and “bloggers” during a conference call from Iraq. In addition, the governor of Kirkuk province “is reviewing every project...

JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia, Jan 18 (Reuters) - Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Sunday that Saudi Arabia should sell oil for gold, not dollars, to avoid being "short-changed" by a decline in the U.S. currency. "The price of oil is $33, but the U.S. dollar has declined by 40 percent against the euro so you're effectively getting $20," Mahathir told an economic conference in Saudi Arabia's Red Sea city of Jeddah. "So you're being short-changed." Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter, has justified higher world oil prices by saying they are necessary to compensate for the slide...

Billions of dollars worth of new, hard-to- counterfeit Iraqi dinar bank notes are now officially in circulation throughout the country, the Coalition Provisional Authority reported today. The new money became the official currency of Iraq Jan. 15 after a three-month exchange period that also has involved the destruction of tons of Saddam Hussein-era notes, according to a joint CPA-Central Bank of Iraq news release. "The new dinar is a real improvement over the old," Ahmed Salman Jaburi, deputy governor of Iraq's Central Bank, asserted in the news release. Because the new money has security features that make it hard to...

I just came home from a Christmas party in Fairfax, VA. Among the attendees at the gathering where judges, generals and elected federal/local politicians. One such elected politician attending was Rep. Tom Davis of the 11th congressional district in Virginia. Mr. Davis just finished a term as the head of the Republican National Congressional Committee. I got a chance to talk with Representative Davis for several minutes. The discussion turned to Iraq, which the representative had recently visited. During the conversation, Mr. Davis pulled out some Iraqi 250 Dinar bills, and handed a few out. The bill in question: Is...

A half-billion Iraqi dinars were seized at Umr Qasr. Yet the burning question remains: what was its final destination?? We think we know... ; )

U.S. officials to begin getting rid of Iraqi dinars with Saddam's image ASSOCIATED PRESS BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 7 — U.S. authorities announced Monday they will begin replacing Iraq's dinar in October in a currency swap that will rid the bill of the image of Saddam Hussein, months after his fall from power.