EGYPT: Protesters highlight Hosni Mubarak’s wealth

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Many protesters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square carried signs Thursday that referred to President Hosni Mubarak and the number 70 billion.

Egypt’s embattled president and his family’s net worth is estimated at between $40 and $70 billion, according to experts’ estimates.

Amaney Jamal, a political science professor at Princeton University, told ABC News that Mubarak’s estimated net worth is comparable with that of other leaders in Persian Gulf countries.

Jamal said that Mubarak’s assets were most likely in banks outside Egypt, possibly in Britain and Switzerland.

‘This is the pattern of other Middle Eastern dictators so their wealth will not be taken during a transition. These leaders plan on this,’ she said.

The Mubarak family owns properties in London, Paris, Madrid, Dubai, Washington, New York and Frankfurt, according to a report from IHS Global Insight.

Aladdin Elaasar, author of ‘The Last Pharaoh: Mubarak and the Uncertain Future of Egypt in the Obama Age,’ said Mubarak and his family own several residences in Egypt, some inherited from previous presidents and the monarchy.

‘He had a very lavish lifestyle with many homes around the country,’ Elaasar, who estimates the family’s wealth is between $50 and $70 billion, told the Economic Times. RELATED

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— Molly Hennessy-Fiske