British Army to help turn dictator's palace into a museum

The British Army is offering to help create a museum in Basra, which would be set up by the Iraqi authorities in one of Saddam Hussein’s palaces. British military planners have codenamed the project Operation Bell, after Gertrude Bell, the archaeologist who helped establish the Baghdad Museum in 1926. Assistance is also being offered by the British Museum, but all parties stress that this is an Iraqi venture.