BERLIN — A quarter of Germans believe there were positive aspects to Nazi rule, according to a poll published Wednesday -- a finding that comes after a popular talk show host was fired for praising Nazi Germany's attitude toward motherhood.

Pollsters for the Forsa agency, commissioned by the weekly magazine Stern, asked whether National Socialism also had some "good sides (such as) the construction of the highway system, the elimination of unemployment, the low criminality rate (and) the encouragement of the family.''

Forsa said 25 per cent responded "yes'' -- but 70 per cent said "no.''

Stern commissioned the survey, conducted Oct. 11-12, after Germany's NDR public broadcaster last month fired talk show host Eva Herman over comments she made about the Third Reich.

News reports quoted Herman as saying there was "much that was very bad -- for example, Adolf Hitler,'' but there were good things under the Nazis, "for example, the high regard for the mother.''

Herman, 48, who has written books urging a return to more traditional gender roles, has stood by her comments.

"What I wanted to express was that values which also existed before the Third Reich, such as family, children and motherhood, which were supported in the Third Reich, were subsequently done away with by the 68ers,'' she later said, referring to 1960s-era leftists.

Praising the 1933-45 Nazi dictatorship is taboo in Germany. The Nazis were responsible for the murder of some six million Jews and for starting the Second World War -- a conflict in which at least 60 million people died, including more than seven million Germans.

The poll, which had a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points, showed that people 60 or older had the highest regard for aspects of the era, with 37 per cent answering "yes.''

Those who grew up directly after the war, now aged 45 to 59, were the least enthusiastic about the Nazi era, with only 15 per cent responding "yes.''