'Gaddafi, family possess wealth "in excess of 20 billion dollars"'

Berne, Feb 26 (ANI): Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader who has ruled the country for over 40 years, and his family possess wealth "in excess of 20 billion dollars," an intelligence source has said.

"With all those revenues flowing through the national government, through the treasury, it's pretty easy to tap those revenues for various purposes," CBS News quoted Raymond Baker, Director of the Global Financial Integrity, as saying.

The Swiss government has already ordered a freeze on the assets belonging to Gaddafi in that country.

Earlier, Wikileaks had quoted a January 2010 State Department cable written by current ambassador Gene Cretz, as saying that Qaddafi's regime controls 32 billion dollars in liquid assets around the world, adding that "several American banks are each managing 300-500 million dollars" in regime funds, the report said.

"I remember interviewing the Director of the Central Bank at one point who admitted that quite frankly, he had no idea for some years what money went where, and under what circumstances," said Dirk Vandewalle, author of "A History of Modern Libya" had claimed. (ANI)