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Up until the cold-blooded-mass-killings by home-grown white supremacist terrorist Anders Breivik, most people thought Norway was one of the safest nations on earth. The double attack left not only Norway, but also the world, stunned and in search of answers as to how this could’ve happened. The Breivik case took a new twist yesterday when a statement, allegedly from the “Knights Templar”, demanded his release. Norway’s been forced to take a cold hard look at itself, and in a 482-page report submitted to Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg on the failures that allowed the madman to bomb government buildings and run rampant executing youth for hours, it’s come to rational and practical solutions, finding fault with key areas of security that failed to deter Breivik.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the report found that the authorities were aware of the activities of Breivik months before the attacks, when he purchased huge quantities of materials, including liquid fertiliser, that one could use to make bombs, but the security services never placed him on a watch list. The report noted, “We could’ve prevented the attack on the government complex on 22 July through effective implementation of already adopted security measures”. Apart from the aforementioned problem, another key finding was that the government buildings Breivik attacked weren’t sufficiently hardened against sabotage, they’d been identified as a security risk years earlier, but they were never properly brought up to standards.
As security services and police the world over know, if preventative measures fail, then, response time is of utmost importance in extreme situations. According to the report, key responses and measures failed miserably, and these failures, for the most part, were in the command structure. Norway has world-class highly-trained security personnel, but their deployment wasn’t effective; the military didn’t get timely information, and those involved didn’t follow set emergency procedures. First responders didn’t even have a description of Breivik until 20 minutes after the first attack, which they could’ve used to stop him before he reached Utøya Island. The most critical failure was when authorities were aware of the massacre taking place on Utøya Island, but they wasted critical time, which allowed Breivik to gun down his young victims on the island for 75 minutes. According to the Jerusalem Post, apparently, they couldn’t find a helicopter, and the boat they were supposed to use wasn’t able to carry all of the security forces responding to the attack.
Although part of the blame lies with the authorities, a large part has to lie with society, because of its inability to comprehend the viciousness and insanity of predators like this, so, they aren’t prepared to deal with them. Yes, sadly, part of the blame lies with peace-loving people, who can’t comprehend the monstrosities that some men are capable of. We saw this with Hitler, we saw this on 9/11, and we saw this with Breivik. For countries like Russia, the USA, Israel, and the UK, just to list a few, society and the authorities are ready, prepared, and experienced in dealing with these sorts of attacks; unfortunately, for Norway, it was a wakeup call from Breivik, who mercilessly took advantage of weaknesses in the security architecture of the country.
As the government of Norway and the world continue to debate on security, the inhumanity and unrepentant nature of Breivik and his brethren continues to make a mockery of the civilised world, with a statement allegedly from the supposed “Knights Templar”, an organisation that Breivik claimed to be a member of, but which has no connection to the real order of the Knights Templar. Furthermore, forensic criminologists involved in the Breivik case doubt that the organisation actually exists. The e-mail demands that that the court find Breivik innocent and that his actions were necessary in waging the war that they are involved in. The writer calls Breivik, “their commander”, and vows to destroy the upper echelon of Norwegian society if the court doesn’t meet their demands to free Breivik. The e-mail was sent to recipients all over the country on Monday, after the release of the report mentioned above, prompting an investigation of the purported “Second in command of the Knights Templar Norway” by the Police Security Service of Norway (PST). In the e-mail, the writer claims to be the “deputy commander” of a cell of the organisation in Norway, and issued a warning to all advocates of multiculturalism.
I agree with what Jay Rubenstein, a blogger at the Huffington Post, wrote, “As a historian, I do recognize in him (Breivik) a peculiarly Western Christian transgression, one as old as Philip the Fair… projecting vile, sick, and paranoid dreams onto the Knights Templar… distorting what was originally, in fact, a warped vision of Christian virtue, and using it as justification for bringing dark fantasies to life”. Many believe that the Knights Templar were an honourable noble company, which even protected Jews; its name is used by hate groups to justify their sick abhorrence of others. Like the Ku Klux Klan, who claim to be “Christian Knights”, Breivik’s delusional belief system blasphemes the Christian Faith. The Knights Templar fought for the defenceless, I seriously doubt they would’ve supported a madman who cold-bloodedly gunned down children in a twisted insane quest to cleanse his country of “inferior” ethnics through bloodshed.
14 August 2012
John Robles
Voice of Russia World Service
http://english.ruvr.ru/2012_08_14/Security-Services-society-and-Templar-Knights-blasphemed-by-Breivik/
Voices from Russia 
Utøya Survivors to Sit In Norwegian Parliament
Tags: 2011 Oslo Terrorist Incident, 2013 Norwegian Parliamentary Election, Anders Behring Breivik, AUF, Breivik, Erna Solberg, EU, European Union, Gunn Karin Gjul, Jens Stoltenberg, Labour, Norway, Norwegian Labour Party, political commentary, politics, Politics of Norway, Prime Minister of Norway, Utøya
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Young candidates from the Labour Party will take part in the first parliamentary election since Breivik’s Massacre in Norway. The 27 survivors chosen from the Worker’s Youth League (AUF) of the Labour Party are expected to be slightly different from previous generations and raise tough questions. Usually, once left-wing young Labour MPs sit in the parliament (Stortinget), they’re likely to share more mainstream views with the rest of the party. However, this generation is believed to confirm confidence in staying true to their beliefs.
Gunn Karin Gjul, a Labour MP, in speaking about the terrorist attack in 2011, when 77 people were killed at the summer camp on Utøya island, noted, “The 22 July generation is a very unique generation within the Labour Party; their ideas were tested in a way that no generation since World War II in Norway has been”. The main question in the AUF candidates’ agenda is oil production. The youth wing would like some parts of the Norwegian continental shelf environmentally protected, the other branches of the party don’t believe this necessary. Another point is the immigration problem, as the AUF wants the government to be more tolerant in this respect. The liberal views of AUF members were one reason for Breivik’s attack… he wanted to stop immigration from Muslim countries to Norway and the AUF seemed to him an obstacle on the way to this. Gjul added that, as massacre survivors, they might question why Norway lacks the death penalty, why Breivik wasn’t given tougher prison conditions, or why he grew bitter and aggressive.
The crucial point in gaining a seat in the Stortinget is a candidate’s ranking on a party list. Many of the Utøya survivors running for parliament lost primary battles for safe positions higher up, so, now, they’re quite low on the list. Only 3 of the 27 survivors have high enough rankings to get elected for sure. According to Norwegian tradition, young people get involved early in politics. The current Prime Minister, Labour’s Jens Stoltenberg, became an MP at age 32, whilst one of his opponents, Conservative Erna Solberg, won election at age 28.
10 July 2013
Voice of Russia World Service
http://english.ruvr.ru/news/2013_07_10/Ut-ya-survivors-to-be-elected-in-Norwegian-parliament-9633/