In Braunau am Inn, Austria - the town of Adolf Hitler's birth - there is concern the site may become a pilgrimage for Nazi sympathizers. Now, a man dressed as Hitler's doppelgänger has been arrested under anti-Nazi laws.
A horse-drawn wagon stands in front of Adolf Hitler's birth house in this undated photoImage: picture-alliance/dpa
Advertisement
An Austrian man was arrested on Monday after appearing in Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's birth town of Braunau am Inn dressed as Hitler.
The man was detained in his flat in the northern Austrian town of 17,000 inhabitants, which sits on the southern German border.
Multiple reports stated that a man was appearing in public dressed in Hitler's uniform, as well as sporting a haircut and moustache that resembled the dictator's trademark visage. Locals had spotted the costumed man around town at sites including Hitler's birth house and a local bookstore, where he browsed through magazines about World War Two.
The men who led Nazi Germany
The German National Socialist Workers' party profoundly affected the course of 20th-century world history with their ideology, propaganda and crimes. Who were the key leaders of the movement?
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945)
As Hitler's Propaganda Minister, the virulently anti-Semitic Goebbels was responsible for making sure a single, iron-clad Nazi message reached every citizen of the Third Reich. He strangled freedom of the press, controlled all media, arts, and information, and pushed Hitler to declare "Total War." He and his wife committed suicide in 1945, after poisoning their six children.
Image: picture-alliance/Everett Collection
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)
The leader of the German National Socialist Workers' Party (Nazi) developed his anti-Semitic, anti-communist and racist ideology well before coming to power as Chancellor in 1933. He undermined political institutions to transform Germany into a totalitarian state. From 1939 to 1945, he led Germany in World War II while overseeing the Holocaust. He committed suicide in April 1945.
Image: picture-alliance/akg-images
Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945)
As leader of the Nazi paramilitary SS ("Schutzstaffel"), Himmler was one of the Nazi party members most directly responsible for the Holocaust. He also served as Chief of Police and Minister of the Interior, thereby controlling all of the Third Reich's security forces. He oversaw the construction and operations of all extermination camps, in which more than 6 million Jews were murdered.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Rudolf Hess (1894-1987)
Hess joined the Nazi party in 1920 and took part in the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, a failed Nazi attempt to gain power. While in prison, he helped Hitler write "Mein Kampf." Hess flew to Scotland in 1941 to attempt a peace negotiation, where he was arrested and held until the war's end. In 1946, he stood trial in Nuremberg and was sentenced to life in prison, where he died.
Image: Getty Images/Central Press
Adolf Eichmann (1906-1962)
Alongside Himmler, Eichmann was one of the chief organizers of the Holocaust. As an SS Lieutenant colonel, he managed the mass deportations of Jews to Nazi extermination camps in Eastern Europe. After Germany's defeat, Eichmann fled to Austria and then to Argentina, where he was captured by the Israeli Mossad in 1960. Tried and found guilty of crimes against humanity, he was executed in 1962.
Image: AP/dapd
Hermann Göring (1893-1946)
A participant in the failed Beer Hall Putsch, Göring became the second-most powerful man in Germany once the Nazis took power. He founded the Gestapo, the Secret State Police, and served as Luftwaffe commander until just before the war's end, though he increasingly lost favor with Hitler. Göring was sentenced to death at Nuremberg but committed suicide the night before it was enacted.
Image: Three Lions/Getty Images
6 images1 | 6
The "Oberoesterreichische Nachrichten" newspaper reported that the man had also appeared in a local bar and identified himself as "Harald Hitler."
The arrest was predicated on a 1947 Austrian law that made it illegal to promote Nazi ideology.
"It was obvious that he glorified Hitler," local police spokesman David Furtner told French press agency AFP.
The house where Hitler was born has been at the center of a legal debate for several years. The Austrian government wants to remove the current owner to raze the building in order to prevent the site from becoming a pilgrimage site for Nazi sympathizers.
However, the current owner of the building has challenged the government's attempt in court.
Hitler was born in the town in 1889 before leading Nazi Germany for 12 years, ushering in World War Two and the Holocaust.
