Dutch tourist detained over Nazi salute at Auschwitz

Dutch woman explained it was a 'bad joke' when reprimanded by guards

The 'Work Sets you Free' gate of the Auschwitz Nazi death camp in Oswiecim, Poland. AP

Polish police said on Sunday they had detained a Dutch tourist for giving the Nazi salute at the site of the former death camp, Auschwitz-Birkenau.

"Officers from [the southern city of] Oswiecim detained a 29-year-old woman from the Netherlands today," regional police tweeted.

"The tourist had been performing the Hitler salute in front of the Arbeit Macht Frei [Work Sets you Free] gate.

"The detainee was charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda. She confessed."

Prosecutors issued her with a fine as punishment, which she accepted, the Polish news agency Pap reported.

It said she was caught in the act by guards while posing for a photo taken by her husband.

"She explained it away as a bad joke," regional police spokesman Bartosz Izdebski said.

Nazi Germany built the death camp in Oswiecim after occupying Poland during the Second World War.

The Holocaust site has become a symbol of Nazi Germany's genocide of six million European Jews, one million of whom died at the camp between 1940 and 1945 along with more than 100,000 non-Jews.