A police station has been officially opened at the house in Braunau am Inn, Austria, where Adolf Hitler was born in 1889. The move is part of an effort to rid the site of its Nazi link and prevent it from becoming a destination for Neo-Nazi pilgrims. The building, a 17th-Century former inn, has been refurbished and now features security cameras to record the activities of anyone visiting the site.
The house has been a source of controversy for years, with the Austrian government wanting to find a way to distance it from its dark past. In the past, the building was rented from its former owner, Gerlinde Pommer, and was used as a day centre and workshop for people with special needs. However, when the local charity that ran the centre was forced to move out in 2011, the house remained empty for several years as the authorities and Pommer argued over terms.
In 2016, Austria's parliament passed a law allowing the government to seize the house from Pommer, who was paid €812,000 (£690,000) in compensation. However, some local residents have expressed concerns that the decision to open a police station at the site sends the wrong signal and that the house should have been used as a centre for confronting the Nazi past.
Florian Kotanko, a local historian, said that the site's history will never be able to be erased, and that the best way to deal with it is in an open and correct way. The building now features a stone on the street outside, which was erected in 1989, with the inscription 'Never again Fascism; In memory of millions of dead.'
The police station is intended to serve as a deterrent to anyone who may be planning to visit the site with malicious intentions. However, some have questioned whether this move will be effective in preventing the site from becoming a destination for Neo-Nazis.