The Middle East News Agency (MENA) will put up for auction a 1989 Mercedes that had been driven once by late Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

Hussein had gifted Mercedes-Benz 230 model cars to Egyptian chief editors in 1989 before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.
The car at the time was valued at EGP 160,000 and was a bid by Hussein to win over the chief editors, MENA Chief Editor and Board Chairman Alaa Heidar said.
Recalling the past, Heidar said, on 15 June 1989, when he was just a young journalist at MENA, he attended a meeting grouping Hussein and Egyptian, Jordanian and Yemeni leaders at the time Hosni Mubarak, King Hussein and Ali Abdullah Saleh, respectively, in Alexandria that was attended also by Egyptian chief editors.
Saddam Hussein looked at the parked cars line, all Mercedes, and said he wants to drive one and picked MENA's for its distinguished color, golden hazel, while all the others were black, Heidar said.
The car will be sold at an auction starting from half a million dollars on September 15 on the following websites:
http://www.mazadq8.com/vb/index.php
http://www.emiratesauction.ae/ar/
http://www.almzaad.com