February 29, 2004

Hussein's Regime Skimmed Billions From Aid Program NY Times - In its final years in power, Saddam Hussein's government systematically extracted billions of dollars in kickbacks from companies doing business with Iraq, funneling most of the illicit funds through a network of foreign bank accounts in violation of United Nations sanctions. Millions of Iraqis were struggling to survive on rations of food and medicine. Yet the government's hidden slush funds were being fed by suppliers and oil traders from around the world who sometimes lugged suitcases full of cash to ministry offices, said Iraqi officials who supervised the skimming operation. 10:50:35 PM

DVD copiers win big in state court ruling San Francisco Chronicle - A state appellate court has rebuffed a movie industry attempt to keep a DVD-unscrambling program off the Internet, saying the code has been so widely circulated that it may not qualify as a trade secret. 10:31:34 PM

Box Office Hit 'Nemo' Now Has Oscar Pedigree Reuters -  "Finding Nemo," the summer box office hit about a clownfish searching the seas for his lost son, won the Oscar on Sunday for best animated feature film, putting the Hollywood stamp of approval on one of the most successful animated films ever. 10:27:25 PM

Microsoft enlists developers in security push CNET News.com - Microsoft is readying updates to its programming tools that will be released in tandem with Windows XP Service Pack 2, a security-oriented release of Windows due later this year. 10:24:50 PM

Antarctic dinosaurs found in icy graves ABC Science Online - Two new species of dinosaur, one a meat eater, the other a plant eater, have been found in Antarctica, by an international team of scientists. 10:24:07 PM

Catholic abuse reports paint disturbing picture USA Today - America's Catholic leaders have confronted the clergy sexual abuse scandal in two new reports. One is a statistical study how many abusers since 1950, how many victims and the financial costs of abuse conducted by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. The other, an analysis of the causes and context of abuse and the church's failure to face and correct it, was conducted by a national review board of prominent lay Catholics. USA TODAY's Cathy Lynn Grossman looks at the reports' findings. 10:23:08 PM