Banca di Roma, Tripoli

This Banca di Roma building played an important role in Italy's colonization of Libya.  As a posting outside the bank puts it:  This building was "used by Bank of Rome as a branch of the central bank in Italy, aiming to find an excuse to colonize Libya."  You might walk past the outside without noticing it these days, in part because it's in a quiet section of the medina, but here's a shot of the ceiling.

After a stint as a museum and some other uses, it's now a bank again.  According to this posting, it's a branch of Umma Bank.  But the sticker and a sign inside leads me to believe that it may also serve as a Western Union.