BERLIN — The speaker of Germany’s parliament has a given a tour of the building to a special group of visitors, all of whom were born in its basement in the final years of World War II.
Some 60 to 80 children are thought to have been born in the Reichstag building, whose basement was used as an air-raid shelter and improvised maternity ward by the nearby Charite hospital.
Speaker Wolfgang Schaeuble told the group Sunday that exactly how many of them there are, however, is unknown because all the paperwork was destroyed.
But some of the visitors had their own documents, like Berliner Michael Turnes who said his birth certificate reads “born in the Reichstag.”
He told dpa news agency, “every time I give my birth certificate to someone they’re dumbfounded.”
The Associated Press
