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July 23, 2011
Death Toll Rises to 91 After Pair of Attacks in Norway
Death Toll Rises to 91 in Norway Attacks
OSLO — The Norwegian police on Saturday charged a 32-year-old man, whom they identified as a Christian fundamentalist with right-wing connections, over the bombing of a government center here and a shooting attack on a nearby island that together left at least 91 people dead.
The police said they did not know if the man, identified in the Norwegian press as Anders Behring Breivik, was part of a larger conspiracy. He is being questioned under the country’s terrorism laws and is cooperating with the investigation, they said.
“We are not sure whether he was alone or had help,” a police official, Roger Andresen, said at a televised press conference, adding: “What we know is that he is right-wing and a Christian fundamentalist.” So far Mr. Breivik has not been linked to any anti-jihadist groups, he said.
The police said the suspect had used “a machine pistol” in the attack, but declined to provide further details.
Of the at least 84 people killed on the island, some were as young as 16, the police said on national television early Saturday. They said the death toll could rise further as they continue to search for bodies in the waters around the island.
Terrified youths jumped into the water to escape. “Kids have started to swim in a panic, and Utoya is far from the mainland,” said Bjorn Jarle Roberg-Larsen, a Labor Party member who spoke by phone with teenagers on the island, which has no bridge to the mainland. “Others are hiding. Those I spoke with don’t want to talk more. They’re scared to death.”
Many could not flee in time.
“He first shot people on the island,” a 15-year-old camper named Elise told The Associated Press. “Afterward he started shooting people in the water.”
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Norway police seek to charge 3 over bomb plot
Norwegian security police are seeking charges against three men suspected of planning Scandinavian bomb attacks in an alleged plot with possible al Qaeda connections, state broadcaster NRK reported Friday.
After their arrest last July the three told different stories -- one admitting a plot to blow up China's embassy in Norway, one saying his target was a Danish newspaper that printed cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, and one professing his innocence.
The Norwegian Police Security Service had no immediate comment when contacted by Reuters Friday, and NRK did not say what charges the service proposed in a recommendation to Norway's prosecuting authority.
The presumed leader of the trio, Mikael Davud, an ethnic Uighur from China with Norwegian citizenship, "had plans for a bomb that was supposed to be exploded at the Chinese embassy," his attorney, Carl Rieber-Mohn, told NRK last September.
Suspect Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak, an Iraqi Kurd with Norwegian residency, confessed to planning a bomb attack against Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that published the Mohammad cartoons in 2005, the police have said.
The third suspect, David Jakobsen, an Uzbek with Norwegian residency, has denied any illegal activity and was released from custody in October after the Norwegian Supreme Court rejected a security service appeal to keep him jailed.
On announcing their arrest last year, security service chief Janne Kristiansen said: "We believe this group has had links to people abroad who can be linked to al Qaeda, and to people who are involved in investigations in other countries, among others the United States and Britain."
In a separate case, a Danish court Friday extended the detention of four men charged with plotting an act of terrorism against the paper that published the cartoons of the Prophet. The drawings, including one showing him with a bomb in his turban, caused widespread outrage among Muslims.
(Reporting by Oslo newsroom, Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
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The 17-story building … also houses Norway’s biggest tabloid newspaper VG.”
“NATO member Norway has sometimes in the past been threatened by leaders of al Qaeda for its involvement in Afghanistan, but political violence is virtually unknown in the country.”
“CNN: Is reporting that a second explosion took place after the first one, this is a hallmark of al-Qaeda attacks, multiple bombs set to kill and maim responders and onlookers from the first attack.”
The jihadi forums are reportedly celebrating the blasts.
Update: According to The Guardian, NRK is reporting that an unknown group called “Helpers of the Global Jihad” have posted a message that this is only the beginning of the reaction to Norwegian periodicals publishing the Muhammed cartoons, according to Andrew Boyle, a journalist in Norway.
The NY Times has more on the terror group:
A terror group, Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami (the Helpers of the Global Jihad), issued a statement claiming responsibility for the attack, according to Will McCants, a terrorism analyst at CNA, a research institute that studies terrorism. The message said the attack was a response to Norwegian forces’ presence in Afghanistan and to unspecified insults to the Prophet Muhammad. “We have warned since the Stockholm raid of more operations,” the group said, apparently referred to a bombing in Sweden in December 2010, according to Mr McCants’ translation. “What you see is only the beginning, and there is more to come.” The claim could not be confirmed.
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Wild Thing's comment......
It is confusing, some reports say it was the one person then others say the bombing was not done by the killer in the above photo at the top of this post.
Prayers for the loved ones of these victims. What a horrible thing to happen!!!
Posted by Wild Thing at July 23, 2011 06:47 AM
