The Dutch woman, 29, made the offensive gestures in front of the Arbeit Macht Frei gate as her husband took a photo – she was caught by the guards and charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda
Image: REUTERS)
A tourist has been detained after giving the Nazi salute at the Auschwitz death camp claiming it was a “bad joke”, Polish police say.
The Dutch woman, 29, made the offensive gestures in front of the Arbeit Macht Frei (meaning Work Sets You Free) gate.
She was caught by guards while posing for a photo that her husband was taking, Poland’s PAP news agency reported.
Regional police press officer Bartosz Izdebski told PAP: “She explained it away as a bad joke.”
The woman, who has not been named, was charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda.
Local police tweeted: “Officers from (the southern city of) Oswiecim detained a 29-year-old woman from the Netherlands today.
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Image:
AFP via Getty Images)
“The tourist had been performing the Hitler salute in front of the ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ (Work Sets You Free) gate. The detainee was charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda. She confessed.”
They later added: “The detainee was charged with promoting Nazism.
“The woman confessed. Such offence is punishable by a fine, restriction of liberty or imprisonment for up to two years.”
An unspecified fine was issued, which she agreed to pay.
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It is not the first time tourists have been arrested for promoting Nazi propaganda in Poland.
In 2018, Polish police launched an investigation to try and identify three girls who performed a Nazi salute outside the gate.
According to local media, the girls uploaded the image to Instagram but had quickly taken it down.
However, officials at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum had already been alerted to the image and informed the public prosecutor’s office.
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Image:
Getty Images/DeAgostini)
Two Turkish students were sentenced to six months in jail, suspended for three years, and fined for a similar Nazi salute at Auschwitz in 2013.
Auschwitz was a concentration camp built by the Nazis during World War 2 in occupied Poland.
Some 1.3million people, 90 per cent Jews, are thought to have been killed there between 1942 and 1944.
Those deported to the camp complex were gassed, starved, worked to death and even killed in medical experiments.
The vast majority were murdered in the gas chambers at the Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp.
During the Nazi’s campaign to eradicate Europe’s Jewish population, some six million Jews died in the Holocaust.
The camp was liberated by Soviet troops in early 1945. The site has now been turned into a museum and memorial.
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