Memorial stone for Nguyễn Ngọc Châu and Đỗ Anh Lân

Nguyễn Ngọc Châu and Đỗ Anh Lân fled from Vietnam to Hamburg in 1980 and lived in a refugee shelter on Halskestrasse in Billbrook. Nguyễn Ngọc Châu was a teacher born in 1958, and Đỗ Anh Lân was a student born in 1962. On 22 August 1980, three members of the far-right terrorist organisation known as the ‘Deutsche Aktionsgruppen’ (German Action Groups) threw incendiary devices into the shelter. A fire broke out in the room shared by Nguyễn Ngọc Châu and Đỗ Anh Lân, and both men died from their injuries shortly afterwards. 

The perpetrators were sentenced in 1982. Nguyễn Ngọc Châu and Đỗ Anh Lân were buried in the Öjendorf Cemetery, but their graves were dismantled 25 years later. A monument designed by the artist Vān Ngân Hoàng was placed on the site in 2020. 

Since 2014, an initiative has been campaigning for a public memorial and for part of Halskestrasse to be renamed.