Stasi Museum "Runde Ecke"

Museum in der “Runden Ecke”: Bugs, forged rubber stamps, number plates and passports, devices for opening post, a workshop for making disguises and preserved smells – these are just some of the legacies of the Ministry of State Security shown by the Citizens’ Committee in the permanent exhibition of contemporary history called “Stasi – Power and Banality”. The original tools of the trade of the Ministry of State Security document its history, structure and methods of operation using the Leipzig district administrative department as an example. They are supplemented by selected photographs and documents.

A tour of the exhibition “Stasi – Power and Banality” brings home to visitors how the SED developed its surveillance state and systematically robbed GDR citizens of their basic rights. In 1989 hundreds of thousands of demonstrators overthrew the dictatorship and won back their democratic freedoms. The exhibition is designed to make people aware of, among other things, how significant these victories won by the Peaceful Revolution still are today. Opening hours of the museum are 10 am till 6 pm. There is a public guided tour at 3pm daily. In addition you can borrow an Audioguide in several languages. Every Saturday you can join a guided city tour “In the track of the Peaceful Revolution”. Meeting point is 2pm at the main door of St. Nikolai´s Church.

Stasi Bunker Museum: In the Lübschützer Teiche recreational area near Machern is the former emergency command centre of the leader of the Leipzig district administrative department for State Security and belongs to the Museum in der “Runden Ecke”. In the event of “tension” and the need for “mobilisation” the Leipzig Stasi chief, together with 120 full-time employees and two KGB (Soviet secret service) liaison officers, would have moved his seat of office to Machern. Every last weekend 1pm to 4 pm you can visit the Museum im Stasi-Bunker.