Breivik's Original Plan: Behead Former Norway PM

Confessed killer planned to decapitate Gro Harlem Brundtland
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Apr 19, 2012 7:01 AM CDT
Breivik's Original Plan: Behead Former Norway PM
Accused Norwegian Anders Behring Breivik gestures on arrival at the courtroom, in Oslo, Norway, Wednesday April 18, 2012.   (AP Photo/Lise Aserud/Scanpix Norway/POOL)

Anders Behring Breivik says he was planning to capture and decapitate former Norwegian PM Gro Harlem Brundtland during his shooting massacre on Utoya island. Breivik told a court today that he planned to film the beheading and post the video on the Internet, but Brundtland had already left the Labor Party's youth camp on Utoya when Breivik arrived on July 22. The far-right fanatic said he also planned to kill many more than the 69 people who died on the island. There were nearly 600 people there, and Breivik said, "the goal was to kill them all."

Breivik set off one car bomb, but his original plan was to bomb Oslo's government district, the Labor Party's office, and a third target, possibly the royal palace, he said earlier today in court. "I settled on the palace in a setting where the royal family wouldn't be hurt" for the third bomb, he said. "Most nationalists and cultural conservatives are supporters of the monarchy, including myself." Breivik said the three bombs would be followed by several shooting massacres, if he survived. He ultimately decided against multiple bombs because building one was "much more difficult than I thought." His preferred targets for the shooting massacre were an annual conference of Norwegian journalists or the Labor Party's annual meeting. But he couldn't get prepared in time, so he decided on striking against the summer retreat of the Labor Party's youth wing. Click for more from the trial. (More Gro Harlem Brundtland stories.)

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