2011 Norway attacks

2011 Norway attacks were twin terrorist attacks against the civilian population, the government and a political summer camp in Norway on 22 July 2011. The first was a bomb explosion in Regjeringskvartalet, the executive government quarter of Oslo, at 15:22 (CEST), outside the office of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and other government buildings. The explosion killed seven people and wounded several others. The second attack occurred less than two hours later at a youth camp organized by the youth organization (AUF) of the Norwegian Labour Party (AP) on the island of Utøya in Tyrifjorden, Buskerud. An armed gunman disguised as a policeman opened fire at the campers, killing at least 86 attendees,including personal friends of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and the stepbrother of Norway's crown princess Mette-Marit.

The Norwegian Police Service arrested Anders Behring Breivik, a 32-year-old Norwegian man, for the mass shootings on Utøya and subsequently charged him with both attacks.

The European Union, NATO and several countries around the world expressed their support for Norway and condemned the attacks.

Preparations for the attacks

Breivik has participated for years in debates in Internet forums on the dangers of Islam and Immigration. It is not clear at what point he decided to resort to violence. For years he was cultivating a parallel life to disguise the preparations for the attacks. His parallel life included playing video games, blogging, listening to Euro pop and watching episodes of True Blood, while on Sunday nights he usually dined with his mother.

He was preparing for the attacks from at least as early as the autumn of 2009, when, according to his manifesto, he visited a friend, Peter, in Hungary. He found the Hungarian women very attractive, but had to "avoid relationships for the good of his mission.

Failed attempt to buy weapons in Prague

Breivik spent five days in Prague in late August and early September of 2010. He chose the Czech Republic because the country has one of the most relaxed laws regarding guns and drugs in Europe. Following his Internet inquiry, Breivik noted that "Prague is known in Europe as possibly the most famous transit point for illegal guns and drugs." Despite the fact that Prague has one of the lowest crime rates among European capitals, Breivik observed that he was not looking forward to his trip to the Central European capital, because he has "heard that there are many cruel and cynical criminals.

He hollowed out the rear seats of his Hyundai Atos in order to have enough space for the firearms he hoped to buy. After two days, he bought professional mining materials, which were supposed to give him an alibi in case someone suspected him of preparing a terrorist attack. He wanted to buy an AK-47 assault rifle, a Glock pistol, hand-grenades and a rocket-propelled grenade, stating that getting the latter two would be a "bonus".

Breivik had paid for prostitutes in Prague and had several fake police badges printed to wear with a police uniform, which he had acquired illegally on the internet, and which he later wore during the attack.Contrary to his expectations, he was completely unable to get any firearms in the Czech Republic. In the end he concluded, that Prague was "not an ideal place to get guns" and nothing like "what the BBC reported", and that he had felt "safer in Prague than in Oslo".

Arming in Norway

Following the failed attempt to buy firearms in Prague, he decided to obtain a semi-automatic rifle and a Glock pistol legally in Norway, noting that he had a "clean criminal record, hunting license, and a pump action shotgun Benelli Nova already for seven years", and thus obtaining the guns legally should not be a problem.

Upon returning to Norway, Breivik obtained a legal permit for a Ruger Mini-14 semi-automatic carbine, ostensibly for the purpose of hunting deer. He bought it in autumn 2010 for €1,400. Getting a permit for the pistol proved more difficult, as he had to demonstrate regular attendance at a sport shooting club. He also bought 10 30-round magazines from a US supplier. In November, December and January he went through 15 training sessions at the Oslo Pistol Club, and by mid-January his application to purchase a Glock pistol was approved.

Following his encounter with prostitutes in Prague, Berivik had decided to save €2,000 for obtaining a "luxury prostitute" before the attacks, which was supposed to help him with morale and motivation. He had also planned a last martyr service in a Frogner Church before the attack.

According to his manifesto, Breivik ordered the fertilizers for making explosives on April 27. He started making the explosives in early May, noting how ironic it is that he dwells near the largest army compound in the country, and that "borrowing" explosives from the army would "save him a lot of trouble". On June 13, 2011, he made the first experimental explosion at an unspecified desolate location. On July 15 he rented a car; on July 18 he rigged a car with explosives. His last note from July 22 states that he has enough material for at least 20 explosions.

Oslo bombing

On 22 July 2011 at 15:22 (CEST) a bomb placed in a Volkswagen Crafter was exploded in Grubbegata, between H-blokka and R4 in Regjeringskvartalet, downtown Oslo, near the offices of the Prime Minister of Norway (H-blokka) and several other governmental buildings, such as the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy (R4) and Ministry of Finance.

The explosion started fires in H-blokka and R4, and the shock wave blew out the windows on all floors as well as in the VG house and other buildings on the other side of the square. The streets in the area were filled with glass and debris following the explosion. The wreckage of a car was sighted near one of the affected buildings. A giant cloud of white smoke was reported as a fire continued to burn at the Ministry of Petroleum. The blast was heard at least 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) away.

At 15:26 the police received the first message about the explosion, and at 15:28 the first police patrol reported that it had arrived at the scene. At the same time, news agency NTB was told that the Prime Minister was unhurt and safe.

Following the explosion, police cleared the area and searched for any additional explosive devices.Through media outlets, police urged citizens to evacuate central Oslo.

Police later announced that the bomb was composed of a mixture of fertiliser and fuel, similar to that used in the Oklahoma City bombing.

Casualties

Seven people were killed in the explosion, with fifteen wounded, and eleven seriously wounded. A doctor at the Oslo University Hospital said the hospital staff were treating head, chest and abdominal wounds. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg was unharmed in the blast. Norway’s finance minister, Sigbjørn Johnsen, was on holiday in Denmark at the time.

Fewer people than usual were in the area because the bombing took place during July, the main vacation month for Norwegians, which may have averted a higher death toll.

Impact on transportation

All roads into Oslo's downtown area were closed as security officials evacuated people from the area and warned Oslo residents to stay away from the city center and limit their usage of mobile phones due to concerns of another potential terrorist attack. Public transport into and out of the city was also halted. An e-mail communication with the BBC from a traveller indicated that police were conducting searches in cars on the road to Oslo Airport, Gardermoen, which remained open.

The Gardermoen Line between Lillestrøm and Oslo Airport was also shut down after a suspicious package was found close to the tracks. The same happened at the offices of TV 2 which were evacuated after a suspicious package was found outside the building.

Utøya mass shooting Attack

Approximately one and a half hours after the Oslo explosion, a gunman in police uniform, later confirmed to be Anders Behring Breivik, boarded a ferry at Tyrifjorden, a lake some 40 kilometres (25 miles) northwest of Oslo, to the island of Utøya, the location of the Norwegian Labour Party's annual AUF youth summer camp, which has been organised there every summer since the island was given to AUF by the Oslo faglige samorganisasjon (Oslo Trade Union Confederation) in August 1950.

When he arrived on the island, the gunman presented himself as a police officer who had come over for a routine check following the bombing event in Oslo. He signalled and asked people to gather around him before pulling weapons and ammunition from a bag and indiscriminately firing his weapons, killing and wounding numerous people. He first shot people on the island and later started shooting at people who were trying to escape by swimming across the lake. Survivors on the island described a scene of terror. In one example, 21-year-old survivor Dana Berzingi described how several victims wounded by the gunman pretended to be dead to survive; however Breivik later came by to shoot them again in the head with a shotgun.

A spokesman for the National Police Directorate under the Ministry of Justice and the Police reported that most of the casualties were youths about 15 or 16 years old. Trond Berntsen, an off-duty, unarmed police officer and step-brother of Norway's crown princess Mette-Marit, is among the dead. Some witnesses on the island were reported to have hidden in lavatories or undergrowth, communicating by text message to avoid giving their positions away to the gunman. The mass shooting reportedly lasted for around an hour and a half. It is also reported that the shooter used hollow-point bullets or frangible bullets to cause as much damage as possible. The gunshot wounds are hard to treat, as there is only an entry-wound and no exit-wound, nor any large fragments inside the body.

Police response

Initially, as the besieged people from Utøya tried to call the emergency services, they were told to keep off the line unless they were calling about the Oslo bomb.

At 17:27 the local police district learned about the shooting, and two minutes later the police in Oslo were informed. By 17:38, the Norwegian central anti-terrorist unit Beredskapstroppen was dispatched to Utøya from their headquarters in Oslo. However special forces in Oslo did not have an operative helicopter available that could take them straight to the island. The only helicopter available to the Oslo-based unit was a military one parked 60km south of the capital at Moss Airport in Rygge, and thus the special unit had to reach the location by cars.They reached the ferry crossing at 18:09, but had to wait a few minutes for a boat to take them across. They reached Utøya at 18:25, and two minutes later they arrested the gunman.

When the police arrived at the scene, they were met by survivors begging the officers to throw away their weapons, as they were afraid that the men in uniforms would again open fire on them.

At approximately 03:50 (CEST) on 23 July 2011, NRK and TV2, the two primary Norwegian television networks, broadcast a live press conference from the Sentrum politistasjon in Oslo where Norway's National Police Commissioner Øystein Mæland confirmed the number of fatalities at Utøya to have reached "at least 80" with the count expected to increase.

Shortage of transport capacity

The Norwegian police does not have any helicopters that are suitable for transporting groups of police for an airdrop; the ones they have are useful only for observation. When helicopter transport is needed, the Norwegian police have to rely on assistance from the military. The lack of full transport capacity for the anti-terrorism unit has long been criticized by some within the police force. When at the shore, the police could not find a suitable boat to reach the island. The boat they finally located almost sank because their equipment was so heavy; they had to continuously bail out water as they made the crossing.

Perpetrator

Public broadcaster NRK and several other Norwegian media outlets identified the suspected attacker as Anders Behring Breivik. He was arrested on Utøya for the shootings and also linked to the Oslo bombings. He has been charged with terrorism for both attacks. According to his attorney, Breivik has acknowledged that he is responsible for both the bomb and the shooting during interrogation but denies being guilty.

[edit]Political and religious views

Acting national police chief Sveinung Sponheim said that the suspected gunman's Internet postings "suggest that he has some political traits directed toward the right, and Anti-Muslim views, but whether that was a motivation for the actual act remains to be seen". After being apprehended, Breivik was characterized by officials as being a right-wing extremist and an Islamophobe. Breivik is described by the newspaper Verdens Gang as considering himself a conservative nationalist. The deputy police chief on the scene speculated that Breivik had rightist political leanings and offered the opinion that this amounted to him being a Christian fundamentalist. He has written many posts on the far-right anti Islamic website document.no, He attended meetings of "Documents venner" (Friends of Document), affiliated with the Document.no website.

He is a former member of the Progress Party (FrP) and its youth wing FpU. According to the current FpU leader Ove Vanebo, Breivik was active early in the 2000s, but he left the party as his viewpoints became more extreme.A recently created social media website bearing Breivik's name and picture but of unknown authorship refers to him as an admirer of Winston Churchill and Max Manus, and also of Dutch politician Geert Wilders, whose political party, the Party for Freedom, he describes as "the only true party of conservatives". According to the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), Breivik published a 1518-page manifesto, on his militant right-wing and anti-multicultural ideologies, on the day of the attacks. Among other things, in the manifesto he identified the Beneš Decrees, which facilitated the Expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia after the Second World War, as an example for committing that act on European Muslims.

The Jerusalem Post, describes his manifesto as an extreme, bizarre and rambling screed of a worldview encompassing Islamophobia, far-right Zionism, and "venomous attacks" on Marxism and multiculturalism. In his manifesto he claims that the European Union is a project to create "Eurabia" and describes the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as being authorized by "criminal western European and American leaders".

Attorney

The police initially kept the choice of counsel secret after request from the attorney. Attorney Geir Lippestad elected to act on behalf of Breivik's defence, confirming to the Dagbladet newspaper that Breivik had requested him personally. Lippestad said "I thought carefully about it. Everyone is entitled to a lawyer, even in a case like this, and I decided to accept.

Possible accomplices

Several witnesses at the youth camp expressed doubt that there was only one shooter. The police have received descriptions of a second gunman, and are currently working to confirm or deny the accuracy of this new information. Due to the uncertainty surrounding these witness descriptions and the chaotic nature of the events, the police have, as a matter of precaution, yet to make an official comment on the matter. Breivik has claimed that he acted alone and that he had no accomplices. On 24 July, six more people were arrested in Oslo in connection with the attacks and then released as they are said to be no longer suspected of involvement.

Domestic Reactions

At a press conference on the morning after the attacks, Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and Justice Minister Knut Storberget addressed the country. Stoltenberg called the attack a "national tragedy" and the worst atrocity in Norway since World War II. Stoltenberg further vowed that the attack would not hurt the Norwegian democracy, and said the proper answer to the violence was "more democracy, more openness, but not naivety". In his speech at the memorial service on Sunday 24 July 2011 he returned to the subject of what would be a proper reaction in saying: "No one has said it better than the AUF girl who was interviewed by CNN: If one man can show so much hate, think how much love we could show, standing together. The AUF girl mentioned is Stine Renate Håheim interviewed by CNN's Richard Quest on 23 July 2011. Eskil Pedersen of the Workers' Youth League vowed to "return to Utøya" and urged Norway to continue its tradition of openness and tolerance.

King Harald sent his condolences to the victims and their families, and urged unity.