Five years ago, a new library was opened in Alexandria

Cairo/Prague - Five years ago, on October 16, 2002, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak officially opened the new Alexandria Library, whose predecessor was referred to as the eighth wonder of the world. The most famous library of ancient times was replaced on the Alexandrian coast, at the same location where the lighthouse on the island of Pharos once stood, by the modern Bibliotheca Alexandrina.
The impressive building reminiscent of a huge tilted silver disk has become one of the city's biggest tourist attractions five years after its opening. However, from the critics' perspective, it is merely an exquisite shell. They argue that the true worth of the library is determined by its content. At the time of its opening, the library owned about 400,000 volumes, but it has a capacity for eight million books and has not even come close to that so far.