BEIRUT - The sandbags, sniper slits and pockmarked facade of a Beirut house stand as a chilling reminder of Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war.

Now, over 15 years after the end of the fighting, the building is poised to become a museum aimed at ensuring no-one ever forgets the horrors of those dark days.

"This is a monument produced by the war and it should stay as such," says Mona Hallak, an architect who for more than 11 years has been at the forefront of the battle to save the building from the developers' bulldozers.

"We have been going into public amnesia since the war and anything that prevents that has to be preserved," added Hallak.

Known as the "Yellow House" because of the colour of its stone, the three-storey structure was built in the 1920s by renowned architect Youssef Bey Aftimos. It stands along what used to be known as the "Green Line," which separated Muslim and Christian districts during the war.

Middle class families lived in the building's eight spacious apartments until the outbreak of the war, when Christian militiamen moved in because of its strategic location.

From there, snipers could easily pick off their victims -- be they civilians or enemy fighters -- from slits carved in the walls of the second and third floors that afforded clear views of their targets.

Slogans left by the snipers cover the walls of the house.

"I want to speak the truth," reads one message. "With Gilbert I shall die," reads another.

"This building was used as a war machine and speaks for itself," said Habib Debs, an architect involved in the museum project. "If we keep it as is, it will be an important testament of the war."

Under the plan to preserve the house, it will be turned into an interactive museum named "Beit al-Madina" (the home of the city).

Over recent years many have called for the story of the civil war to be taught in schools to prevent history repeating itself.

At present history lessons in school textbooks stop with the withdrawal of French colonial troops from Lebanon in 1946.

And a lack of consensus over a common version of the war has ensured that this bloody chapter in the nation's history is omitted from text books.

Instead, the Lebanese prefer to use the euphemism "the events" when they mention the civil war that devastated the country, killed more than 150,000 people and left thousands still missing.

For Hallak, the museum will be an opportunity to make sure that future generations know what happened and that those who lived through it never forget.

"The Lebanese must learn to love their city and learn from their mistakes so that they don't destroy it again," Hallak said. "If they see firsthand what the war was like they would never repeat it."