Anders Breivik trial: day four as it happened

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Anders Breivik trial: day four as it happened

April 19th, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

3.52pm The prosecution tells the press conference Breivik will
tomorrow explain exactly what happened on Utoya.

It’s going to be a difficult day to get through tomorrow.

3.48pm A press conference with lawyers involved in the case is
currently ongoing, with some interesting developments.

The prosecution have said they would have liked to have called Breivik’s mother
as a witness, but that she is “unfit to appear in court”. We hear
also that a psychiatrist who assessed Breivik when he was 4-years-old has
been called as a witness.

3.43pm For a summary of the day’s main developments, focussing on Breivik’s
claims that the “primary target” for his attack was in fact the
former prime minister of Norway, see this
piece here.

2.44pm Court is adjourned for the day, we leave you with this from our
man in the courtroom David Blair:

Apart from when the court watched the unedited CCTV footage of the bomb
attack, this has been the most disturbing session so far. We now know that
Breivik considers himself an innocent party who was forced to massacre 67
defenceless teenagers by the media, the Norwegian government and the victims
themselves. A few minutes ago, prosecutor Inga Bejer Engh asked “Do you
consider yourself a person of empathy?” The reply was emphatic: “Absolutely”.

I think today’s hearing will be of great help to the court when it decides
on the question of Breivik’s sanity.

2.34pm Interesting exchange between Breivik and prosecutor Inga
Bejer Engh as they discuss who he sees as a valid target.

The killer said that Norway has 12 “category A” traitors, 4,500 in “category
B” and 90,000 in “category C”.

“So which category am I?” asked Engh.

“Oh, you wouldn’t be on the list at all,” said Breivik.

2.22pm The court has heard that Breivik considered his car bomb
to be a failure because the building he targeted did not collapse.

2.15pm David Blair with the latest:

Breivik planted his bomb later than planned because he first chose to
email his manifesto to far right supporters across Europe. The result? Lots
of error messages as Outlook struggled with such a big email. So the
explosion happened some time later than expected. Some people lived and some
died because of that quirk of fate.

Another quirk of fate – this time a good one. Breivik had picked the exact
spot where he would park his car bomb for maximum effect. But when he
arrived, the place was taken. “The bomb had a lot less force because I
had to ignite it at the wrong angle,” he said.

1.54pm The questioning has turned to Breivik’s use of drugs and
hormones.

1.44pm We are now hearing about the bombs Breivik manufactured.
He had trouble finding a large enough farm to use as a cover story for
justifying the purchase of fertilizer.

1.38pm More detail on the weapons is emerging.

1.28pm We’re now learning about how Breivik went about obtaining
his weapons. His first idea was to go to Prague and buy them from the
criminal fraternity – he told friends he was going on a book tour. He tried
this, but failed. So he decided to obtain his firearms entirely legally.

1.09pm A few thoughts from David Blair during the recess.

The last few minutes have spread ripples of shock throughout the
courtroom. Breivik is effectively saying that everyone forced him to carry
out the massacre – the media, the Norwegian Labour party, the victims
themselves – and that he was just about the only innocent party. The whole
world was out of step, except him. Suddenly, he comes out as the coldest of
narcissistic killers.

1.00pm In the last few minutes, we’ve had a real insight into the way Breivik’s
mind works.

As he sees it, the Norwegian government forced him to carry out the gun
attack on Utoya island by making it hard for him to get hold of the chemical
fertiliser needed to make bombs. Meanwhile, the children on the summer camp forced
him to shoot them by being supporters of “multiculturalism”.

He conceded that it was wrong to kill people “under the age of 18”,
but said that people on the island “turned away from him” while he
was walking around firing his guns, so he couldn’t work out their age. So it
was their fault if they were under 18 and he shot them anyway.

This massacre seems to have been everyone’s fault except Breivik’s.

12.57pm The previous line of questioning, and the chilling responses
from Breivik have clearly had a major impact on those in court.

12.54pm The prosecutor has called for an early recess following
detailed questioning on the Utoya killings. David Blair writes:

Breivik has gone into further excruciating detail about his plans on Utoya
island. The aim was to “kill everybody” on the island – about 500
people at the time – by using the gun attack as a way of spreading terror
and the water as a “weapon of mass destruction”. Breivik thought
that all those who he didn’t shoot would flee into the sea and then drown.
He agreed it was wrong to kill any one under the age of 18, but said that he
would “distinguish” those who were younger. “But that turned
out to be impossible,” he added.

As for why it was necessary to carry out a gun attack, the Norwegian
government had “relieved” him of the possibility of making more
bombs by restricting the availability of chemical fertiliser.

12.50pm Breivik is pinning the blame for his actions on politicians,
the EU and the media.

12.43pm We have moved on to more detailed questioning about his attack,
and how he selected his targets.

12.33pm Breivik has revealed that Gro Harlem Brundtland, the
former prime minister of Norway, was the “primary target” of his
attack. He thought she would be on Utoya island and he would have “cut
her head off while filming it”.

He brought along a bayonet and a knife for this purpose and said he aimed to
handcuff her before decapitating her. “Decapitation is a traditional
European death penalty method,” he explained. “It is not only
al-Qaeda who use it.”

^{Former Norwegian prime minister Gro Harlem Brundtland (AFP/Getty Images)}

12.18pm We’re also hearing more about the research Breivik carried
out before the attacks.

12.16pm If you’re looking for an overview of the developments today,
we’ve written
this piece summing up what we’ve heard so far.

12.10pm We’ve learned another chilling detail about the killer’s plans. David
Blair, in court in Oslo, has more:

He considered hijacking a petrol tanker and detonating it with high
explosives to create a “poor man’s atom bomb” with an explosive
force of 0.1 or 0.2 megatons. The target of this weapon would have been the
annual Labour Day parade, which would have caused the deaths of “several
thousand people”. Breivik described this gathering as a parade of
Communists and said that “only 10 per cent” of the casualties
would have been “innocent.”

12.04pm The handcuffs are of off and the afternoon session has begun.
The questioning picks up where it left off.

11.10am The court has risen for lunch. In the last few minutes we have
heard that Breivik planned to wreak far more devastation than Oslo
suffered on 22 July last year. He had come up with a plan for three car
bombs and a gun attack and his list of targets ranged from newspaper offices
to the royal palace to a square in the centre of Oslo with a particular “pastry
shop”.

Again and again, he came back to his hatred of the media, saying that a
national conference of journalists would have been “the most attractive
target in Norway” and that he considered hitting it with both a car
bomb and a gun attack. But he was not able to complete his preparations in
time. When the court returns, we will presumably learn why he eventually
settled on Utoya island as the setting for his rampage.

^{Chemicals discovered in the garage of Breivik’s farm}

10.55am Our reporter David Blair sends this:

Horrifying details have now emerged of the scale of Breivik’s murderous
ambition. He planned three car bombs and a gun attack. He scouted a variety
of targets including the palace, parliament and Labour party headquarters.
He then aimed to raid the HQ of a TV channel and “execute as many
journalists as possible”. But he would have chosen a day when the King
wasn’t in his palace because “like many cultural conservatives” he
believes in the monarchy.

Two of the car bombs would have weighed a ton each, the third would have
been 500 kg. But Breivik had to scale down his plan when it turned out to be “more
difficult than expected” to make a bomb. Another plan he came up with
was to dress as a Fed Ex delivery man and carry a bomb into the office of
the Aftonposten newspaper.

^{Equipment discovered in the garage of Breivik’s farm}

10.50am More details are emerging about Breivik’s attack plans,
and how they were scaled back due to “production problems”.

10.47am We are learning more about Breivik’s choice of targets.
He says he made the decision to attack political targets rather than Muslims
because “it’s not the fault of the Muslims that they have been invited
here”.

10.37am Breivik has repeatedly attacked the first psychiatric report –
the one that declares him insane – calling it a “fairytale”. The
report states that he only decided to become violent in 2009. He says it was
2006.

An interesting observation on this from Sky News reporter Trygve Sorvaag:

10.35am Breivik has come out as a slow-burn revolutionary, David
Blair reports.

He decided on violent action when he was 20 in 1999, but it took him
another seven years to start scouting out likely targets. In 2006 he began
reconnoitring the government quarter of Oslo – and the attack took place
five years later. In the meantime, he lived with his mother, spent most of
his time in his bedroom and only met her at mealtimes.

10.26am For the first time, the cool, controlled and supremely skilfull
prosecutor, Inga Bejer Engh, has shown signs of exasperation. Breivik
described his manifesto as a “draft” and said that he didn’t
necessarily agree with all of it. Engh fired back: “So you
killed 77 people without being entirely sure whether you agreed with the
manifesto or not?”

“Let me explain,” replied Breivik. “Yes, do!” said
the prosecutor.

10.13am The BBC’s Steve Rosenberg and Sky News reporter Trygve
Sorvaag describe a different Breivik in court today.

10.11am Once again, we see Breivik’s desire to be taken
seriously and play the political philosopher. The purpose of his manifesto
was, he said, to “reconcile” the traditions of national
conservatism, national socialism and the “militant Chrisitianity”
of “true believers”. He wanted to “form a bridge between
these various ideas”.

10.00am David Blair suggests Breivik might have picked the
wrong battle to commemorate:

As someone who is old enough to have learned his history from lessons and
books, as opposed to Wikipedia, I would suggest that the Battle of Lepanto
of 1571 was a far more significant event. This clash at sea destroyed
Turkish naval supremacy in the Mediterranean and began the long retreat of
the Ottoman Empire.

9.56am The significance of “2083”, the date given in Breivik’s
manifesto for a “declaration of independence” for Europe has been
explained. That year will be the 400th anniversary of the defeat of the
Turks at the gates of Vienna in 1683, a battle that halted the Ottoman
Empire’s expansion along the Danube valley.

Breivik will have looked this up on Wikipedia, which he previously admitted
was where he did most of his research, David Blair suggests.

9.46am The court is back in session. The prosecution are returning to Breivik’s
career as a full-time player of World of Warcraft which took up a year
of his life.

9.29am The prosecution are not letting go of Breivik’s ideology and
manifesto, our chief foreign correspondent David Blair reports:

The lawyers are continually probing his motivation for his crimes. As one
of the prosecutors put it, this can be reduced to “two bullet points”,
namely: defending “indigenous” Europeans and expelling Muslims.
Breivik’s thousands of words, most of them copied, boil down to that.

9.23am Court breaks for a 20 minute recess.

^{Breivik is handcuffed and taken back to the cells}

9.17am More from David Blair:

Occasionally, Breivik shows flashes of self awareness. After disclosing
that he gave mythological names to his guns, he told the prosecutor: “The
way you’re trying to describe it, it sounds bizarre and insane”.
Meanwhile, he concedes that “50 – 60 percent” of his manifesto was
a “cut and paste” job where he simply copied other people’s work
in his bedroom. His is visibly embarrassed by this, showing that he has some
sense of how the world perceives him.

^{Breivik in the witness box}

9.11am Breivik gave names from Norse mythology to the weapons he used
to kill 67 people on Utoya island. He called his rifle “Gungnir”
after the magical spear of Odin, and he named his handgun “Mjolnir”
afrer Thor’s hammer. Meanwhile, the vehicle he used to drive to the island
was called “Schleipnid” after the eight-legged horse of Odin. “It’s
a European tradition” to give names to weapons, explained Breivik. “It’s
a great European tradition.”

9.03am Our man in the courtroom David Blair has this:

Computer games such as Call of Duty Modern Warfare were key tools for
Breivik’s preparation for the attack. Virtual reality games allowed him to
practise using a telescopic sight. When he bought the real thing, he
discovered that “you could give it to your grandmother and she would be
an optimal marksman.”

Breivik calculated that his chances of surviving the bomb attack on the
government quarter were only “5 per cent”. He anticipated being “caught
in a pincer action” by armed police and the “only option would
have been to fight my way out”. He was genuinely astonished by the lack
of a security response.

8.58am Breivik laughs in court as he accuses the prosecutor of trying
to “ridicule” him – again – with his questions about playing World
of Warcraft and other computer games.

8.37am Breivik now being asked about his year playing World of
Warcraft. He says his desire to play full time was one of the reasons he
moved back in to his mother’s address, and that he had justified taking a
year off due to his hard work between 2002-2006.

He denies the game, which he played for up to 16 hours a day, had any
influence on him and says it had “nothing to do” with the July
22nd attacks. He insists it is a “strategy game” rather than a
violent one.

8.36am Prosecutor says she is moving on from questions about finances
but will return to them later.

8.28am The questioning is firstly focussing on Breivik’s
business dealings, as The Guardian’s Helen Pidd reveals:

8.13am We have a good idea of what the questioning will focus on today:

8.10am Breivik began by saying he wanted to challenge one of the
psychiatric reports.

8.01am Following the request from the defence, Breivik did not
do the far-right salute as he entered court.

8.00am The Judge has just arrived and Breivik’s next day of questioning
is about to begin.

7.51am Ali Esbati, a survivor of the July 22 attacks, said last
night Breivik appeared to be getting “progressively frustrated
with the questions” on the third day of his trial.

7.40am We are around 20 minutes from the start of day four of the
trial. Breivik has arrived at court but not yet been led into the
courtroom.

Defence lawyers have asked him to stop doing a far-right fist salute as he
enters, which he has done every morning so far.

7.34am The prosecution have outlined what they intend to question Breivik
about today:

7.19am Breivik insisted yesterday he attended a meeting in London in
2002 in which his violent right-wing group, the so-called “Knights Templar,”
was founded. It was here, he claims, that he met his English mentor “Richard”.

Three days after the Norway attacks, the Daily
Telegraph identified and tracked down a British man calling himself Paul Ray,
who admitted that he could have been the mentor Breivik was talking about,
although he denied ever meeting him.

Our Investigations Correspondent Duncan
Gardham writes:

Ray, who blogged under the name “Lionheart,” wrote in 2007: “God will
revive the ancient order of the Knights Templar and count me worthy to die
amongst them in service of my God in protection of the Christian and Jewish
world.”

He described himself as one of the “founding fathers” of the right-wing
English Defence League, which he later abandoned – similarly Breivik wrote:
“I wonder sometimes if one of the EDL founders was one of the co-founders of
[the Knights Templar], I guess I’ll never know for sure.”

7.17am Our chief foreign correspondent David Blair, who has been
in Oslo all week following events, has written this
piece summing up the major developments from yesterday’s hearing.

Anders Behring Breivik’s massacre in Norway was partly inspired by an “English
mentor” who ranked among the most “brilliant political and
military tacticians” in Europe, the killer declared yesterday.

During a meeting with this founding member of the “Knights Templar”
in London, Breivik scribbled 50 pages of notes on how they would, together, “seize
power in Western Europe”.

The third day of Breivik’s trial in Oslo heard him set out the ideological
roots of the carnage he inflicted on 22 July last year, claiming 77 lives.
But the flustered and perplexed killer wilted under cross-examination,
eventually declaring that he wanted either freedom or the death penalty,
because that was the only sentence he could “respect”.

The turning point in Breivik’s transformation into a “militant
nationalist” with a “crusader identity” was a meeting with
three men in London a decade ago. “I did not fully comprehend at the
time how privileged I was to be in the company of some of the most brilliant
political and military tacticians of Europe,” he wrote in his
manifesto. “Some of us were unfamiliar with eachother beforehand, so I
guess we all took a high risk meeting face to face.”

7.15am Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of day four of the
trial of Anders Behring Breivik, the far-Right extremist who
confessed to killing 77 people in Norway
on July 22. The day is due to start at 7am GMT (8am BST, 9am Norway). For a
reminder of those horrific events, and the aftermath the following week, our
live coverage from July is below. You can also see our coverage of day one
of the trial as it happened here,
day two here
and day three here.