Hall still functions as a psychiatric hospital today Graves containing the remains of 220 people and dating back to the Nazi era have been found at a psychiatric hospital in western Austria.
The remains were discovered when a yard belonging to the hospital in Hall in Tyrol province was dug up as part of a construction project.
Building work has now stopped until a investigation is carried out.
It is feared those buried may have been disabled people murdered under the Nazis’ euthanasia programme.
Tens of thousands of people with physical or mental disabilities were killed by the Nazis, who regarded them as unfit to live.
Some 30,000 were killed at one psychiatric hospital alone – Schloss Hartheim, near Linz in upper Austria.
Tilak, the company responsible for the Hall hospital, said the graves contained the remains of people buried between 1942 and 1945.
There were, it added, “suspicions that the dead [were] at least partially victims” of the Nazis’ euthanasia programme.
A spokesman, Johannes Schwamberger, said work on the construction project had been stopped to allow an investigation and to identify the dead.
Hall Hospital remains a functioning psychiatric hospital, with beds for 500 patients.
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