Female Tourist Detained After Giving Nazi Salute at Auschwitz

She said it was a 'bad joke'

By Evann Gastaldo, Newser Staff

Posted Jan 24, 2022 2:29 AM CST

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Female Tourist Detained After Giving Nazi Salute at Auschwitz — This February/March 1945, file photo shows the entry to the concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland, with snow covered rail tracks leading to the camp. (AP Photo/Stanislaw Mucha, File)

A Dutch tourist stood in front of the "Arbeit Macht Frei (Work Sets You Free)" gate at the site of the former Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi death camp in Poland on Sunday and gave the Nazi salute while posing for a photo. The 29-year-old woman said it was just a "bad joke," authorities say, but she was detained and ultimately charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda, the BBC reports. She agreed to pay a fine levied by prosecutors, ABC.net reports. The charge can carry a sentence of up to two years behind bars, and two Turkish students were sentenced to six months in jail in 2013 over a similar incident. (Read more Auschwitz stories.)