The documents seized after the fall of Baghdad were a trove comparable to the files of Stasi, the secret police of East Germany, which collapsed in 1989, an anonymous source told The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.

The Central Intelligence Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation refused to comment on the reports.

According to The Wall Street Journal, some information gleaned from the files had already permitted the FBI to open new criminal and espionage investigations in the United States.

The documents also show Saddam's intention to acquire North Korean missiles with a greater range than the 150 kilometers (93 miles) allowed by the United Nations.

Names of nearly all of Saddam's intelligence agents inside and outside Iraq were found in the files, the two dailies said, along with their written reports, evaluations of their work and payments made to influence officials of other countries.

The recipients of the payments included many high-ranking officials, businessmen and politicians who had agreed to defend Saddam and the regime in public, the newspapers said.

WAR.WIRE