Unmarked Berlin grave of Nazi “Butcher of Prague” Reinhard Heydrich opened

Berlin police are investigating the opening of the unmarked grave of former SS officer Reinhard Heydrich, one of the main architects of the Holocaust, known as the “Butcher of Prague”.

Heydrich was Nazi Reichsprotektor of the so-called protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia when ambushed and shot in May 1942 by a British-trained team of Czech and Slovak paratroopers in ‘Operation Anthropoid’. He eventually died in Berlin the following month.

After the war, the remains of Heydrich and other Nazi leaders were reburied in unmarked graves to prevent Nazi sympathisers turning them into shrines.

German police say that whoever violated Heydrich’s grave in central Berlin’s Invalids' Cemetery likely had inside knowledge of its location. According to preliminary information, nothing was removed, police said.

Author: Brian Kenety