The king-sized bed in Saddam Hussein's superyacht is prepared, the silk curtains around it are unfurled, and in the gold-adorned bathroom next door, a barber's chair awaits its owner.
However, the Iraqi dictator has never boarded the 82-metre Basra Breeze yacht built in 1981 - and its comfort will now be enjoyed by harbor masters who direct shipments in and out of the port of Basra, the south's largest city.
As with other treasures left behind by Saddam, ousted in 2003 during the US invasion of Iraq and hanged three years later for crimes against humanity, successive governments are trying to use the yacht for practical purposes.
Since it was returned to Iraq in 2010 after a court case and a thirty-year odyssey abroad, the yacht has mostly been anchored in Basra.
It has a presidential suite consisting of Saddam's private rooms, dining rooms and bedrooms, as well as 17 smaller guest rooms, 18 crew cabins and a clinic. The luxuriously equipped and decorated vessel was put up for sale for 30 million dollars.
The government, however, was unable to find a buyer, and for the past two years the "Basra Breeze" has been at the disposal of the University of Basra whose researchers have used it for voyages to study marine life.
"The presidential yacht is in very good condition. The two engines and the generator are functional," said its captain, Abdul Zahra Abdul Mahdi Saleh. "She only needs occasional maintenance."
However, the authorities have now decided to anchor her for a longer period to serve as a hotel and recreation for the harbor masters, many of whom live in distant cities.
"The port needs this ship as a rest stop for naval pilots," said port spokesman Anmar al-Safi.
Built in a shipyard today while Iraq was still at war with Iran, the yacht was passed on to Saudi Arabia - then an ally of Saddam's - to protect it from air strikes on Basra, said officials who gave Reuters reporters a tour of the yacht.
Saudi Arabia, whose relations with Saddam soured after Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, then handed the yacht over to Jordan. Later, the ship's movements were unclear until Iraq found it in Nice, France, where it was seized by a court and sent home.
The Basra museum has not given up hope of persuading the port authorities to allow them to dock the ship next to the exhibition halls in one of Saddam's former palaces overlooking the Shatt al-Arab.
"Future generations can see how the dictator lived," said Javad Abdul Kadim, deputy director of the museum.
Saddam's second ship sunk and looted
The "Basrah Breeze" survived Saddam's fall and ruin, while the other ship "Al Mansur" - which he also never boarded - had a different fate. It was sunk in the Shatt al-Arab River that runs past Basra after being hit by American planes, then looted in the ensuing chaos.
In 2003, Saddam futilely ordered the ship to leave Um Qasr, Iraq's largest port outside Basra, where it was anchored, and head for Basra to avoid airstrikes.
"I told the captain of the yacht that the crew should take off their military uniforms, throw away their weapons and ammunition and present themselves as a civilian ship in case they were caught by American warships," said the harbor captain who was piloting the yacht at the time.
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