The Berlin government has announced its willingness to give up for free the villa of Joseph Goebbels, Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister, to end a decades-old debate over the fate of this historic site in the north of the German capital.
In a speech to the state parliament, Berlin’s finance minister, Stefan Evers, expressed the government’s desire to get rid of the villa’s financial and administrative burden due to ongoing maintenance and safety costs.
Evers added that if it does not succeed in finding a new owner who accepts this responsibility, the state will have to resort to the option of demolition.
Built in 1939, the villa is set on 17 hectares and enjoys a location overlooking Lake Bogensee near Vandelitz.
Under Hitler, the villa was used as a home for Goebbels and his family, a reception place for Nazi dignitaries, artists, and actors, and also as a site for private interviews.
After the war, it saw multiple uses, including a hospital and youth training center affiliated with the East German Communist Party, and after German reunification in 1990, ownership of the site returned to the state of Berlin.
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