/ 22 July 2011

Norway attacks: 17 dead, Norwegian man arrested

Norway Attacks: 17 Dead

Seventeen people were killed in two attacks in Norway on Friday — a bomb attack and a shooting rampage — in what may be the work of one man with an axe to grind against the state.

Ten people died in the shooting at a Labour Party youth camp on the Norwegian island of Utoeya, while seven died in a bomb attack in Oslo, police confirmed — later adding that the death toll from the island was likely to rise.

A Norwegian citizen, described by witnesses who called in to Norwegian radio station NRK as “tall, blonde, and speaking in a dialect used by people from the area around Oslo”, was arrested for the attack on the island, and reports suggested the same man was seen at the location of the bomb blast earlier on Friday afternoon.

At a press conference late on Friday, Justice Minister Knut Storberget said: “A person has been arrested… I have been informed that he is a Norwegian.”

Deputy Oslo police chief Sveining Sponheim told reporters the man detained by police was aged 32 and “ethnically Nordic”.

He also said that undetonated explosives had been found on the island.

Guardian correspondent Neil Perry, who is in Oslo, told the British newspaper that he believed that the attacks were “starting to look less like the work of international terrorists and more like that of a lone attacker with a grudge against the government”.

A jihadist group had earlier reportedly claimed responsibility for the bombing, but according to Rune HÃ¥konsen, who works for the Norwegian Broadcasting Corp, the news agency NTB reported that police did not think international terrorists were involved: “Nationen also writes police think its a local variant directed at the current political system”.

Group claims responsibility
Will McCants, a terrorism analyst at US-based terrorism think-tank CNA, told the New York Times that a jihadist group called Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami (the Helpers of the Global Jihad) had claimed responsibility for the bomb attack on a messageboard known to be used by terrorist groups.

The group’s message said the attack was in response both to Norway’s involvement with the West’s military campaign in Afghanistan, and to “unspecified insults to the Prophet Muhammad”.

The newspaper warned the group’s claim could not be confirmed.

Jakub Godzimirski, a senior research fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs said the attacks were more likely the work of a right-winger than Islamist militants.

“It would be very odd for Islamists to have a local political angle,” he told Reuters. “The attack on the Labour youth meeting suggests it’s something else. If [jihadists] wanted to attack, they could have set off a bomb in a nearby shopping mall rather than a remote island. This attack has more in common with the Oklahoma City bombing than an Islamist attack.”

International support
In an interview broadcast by CNN, US President Barack Obama said he had no information yet on the motives, but extended his “personal condolences” to the people of Norway following the blast and shootings in Oslo.

A Reuters witness said several army soldiers had taken up position around the centre of the city.

The bomb ripped through the main government building in the normally sleepy Norwegian capital in the mid-afternoon, killing seven people, police said, and injuring many more.

“It exploded — it must have been a bomb. People ran in panic … I counted at least 10 injured people,” said bystander Kjersti Vedun, who was leaving the area of the blast in Oslo.

The blast tore at the facade of the 17-storey central government building, blowing out most of the windows and scattering shards of metal and other debris for hundreds of metres.

The blast scattered debris across the streets and shook the entire city centre at around 3.30pm (1.30pm GMT). A Reuters witness saw eight people injured, one covered in a sheet and apparently dead.

Most violent ‘since WWII’
The Reuters correspondent said the streets had been fairly quiet in mid-afternoon on a Friday in high summer, when many Oslo residents take vacation or leave for weekend breaks.

“This is a terror attack. It is the most violent event to strike Norway since World War Two,” said Geir Bekkevold, an opposition parliamentarian for the Christian Peoples Party.

The district attacked is the very heart of power in Norway, with several other key administration buildings nearby.

Nearby ministries were also hit by the blast, including the oil ministry, which was on fire. Nevertheless, security is not tight given the lack of violence in the past.

Political violence is virtually unknown in a country known for awarding the Nobel Peace Prize and mediating in conflicts, including in the Middle East and Sri Lanka. — Additional reporting by Reuters, AFP