BERLIN - A German state governor is asking a tiny town to remove a bell adorned with swastikas and Hermann Goering's name from its memorial to Germany's war dead.

The bell was donated by Goering himself to the town -- which once bore the deputy Nazi leader's name and is now called Tuemlauer-Koog.

News magazine Der Spiegel reported Friday the bell, which had hung in the town's belltower, was replaced in 2008 because it was too old to ring anymore and moved to the memorial site. A German tourist recently saw the bell and complained to Schleswig-Holstein governor Peter Harry Carstensen, who asked that it be removed.

Area mayor Christian Marwig acknowledges a sign could better explain the bell's significance but says the Nazi past should be acknowledged and not swept under the rug.