Europe

Austria government: House of Hitler's birth to be demolished

Associated Press
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FILE - This Sept. 27, 2012 file picture shows an exterior view of Adolf Hitler's birth house, front, in Braunau am Inn, Austria. Austria's government said on Monday, Oct. 17, 2016 that it plans to tear down the house where Hitler was born and replace it with a new building. (AP Photo / Kerstin Joensson, File) (The Associated Press)

FILE - This Sept. 27, 2012 file picture shows an exterior view of Adolf Hitler's birth house, front, in Braunau am Inn, Austria. Austria's government said on Monday, Oct. 17, 2016 that it plans to tear down the house where Hitler was born and replace it with a new building. (AP Photo / Kerstin Joensson, File) (The Associated Press)

The Austrian government says it plans to demolish the house where Adolf Hitler was born and erect a new building in its place in efforts to erase any link to the Nazi dictator's birthplace.

Interior Minister Wolfgang Sobotka said Monday that "a thorough architectural remodeling is necessary to permanently prevent the recognition and the symbolism of the building."

Ministry spokesman Karl-Heinz Grundboeck said that effectively means the house, in the western town of Braunau, will replaced by a new structure.

Sobotka says he wants to ensure that any association with Hitler be eliminated at the site, now an occasional place of neo-Nazi pilgrimage.

The owner had repeatedly refused to sell the building. It was unclear whether she changed her mind or if the government acted on plans to dispossess her.