Cairo — Egypt's government will host dozens of foreign leaders and dignitaries on Saturday as it holds an official opening ceremony for the Grand Egyptian Museum , a $1 billion project decades in the making that was plagued by multiple delays and a ballooning of the budget.

The GEM is one of the largest museums in the world, and the largest dedicated to a single civilization: ancient Egypt. Its subject matter spans some 7,000 years, from prehistory to the end of the Greek and Roman eras around 400 A.D.

The initial cost for the more than 5-million-square-foot, triangular-themed structure about a mile from the iconic pyramids of Giza was estimated at $500 million, but the final price tag was more than double that. Costing over $1 billion, the project was funded through Egyptian reso

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