Austria turns Adolf Hitler’s birthplace into police station

What the report says

Al Jazeera, citing AFP, DPA and Reuters, reports that Austria has opened a police station in the house where Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, near the German border. The opening took place on Wednesday, July 22, 2026, after years of debate over how to handle a site associated with the Nazi dictator.

According to the report, Austrian officials intend the conversion to discourage neo-Nazis from treating the building as a symbolic destination. The state bought the terraced house in 2017, announced the police-station plan in 2019, and spent about 20 million euros ($22.8m) on the renovation. District and local police officers will now work from the building.

Braunau Mayor Johannes Waidbacher said at the ceremony that the project was meant to show the town was facing its past and taking responsibility. Interior Minister Gerhard Karner attended, and Stephan Mlczoch, who heads the Interior Ministry’s history department, said the redesign was intended to remove the building’s association with Hitler and reduce its aura. Al Jazeera notes that Hitler was born there on April 20, 1889, and that his family left only weeks later.

The decision remains contested. Robert Eiter of the Mauthausen Committee and the Network Against Racism and Right-Wing Extremism argued that changing the building’s use would not erase its historical significance or stop extremist visitors. Some residents also preferred another use, including a charitable function. A stone from the Mauthausen concentration camp bearing an anti-fascist message remains outside, now joined by a police sign.