21-year term ends agonising chapter in Norway’s history

A chapter of a terror case that has haunted Norway for 13 months has closed with confessed mass killer Anders Behring Breivik being declared sane and sent to prison for bomb and gun attacks that killed 77 people and injured 200 others last year.

After deliberating for two months, a five-judge panel in Oslo’s district court handed down a sentence of “preventive detention” of at least 10 years and a maximum of 21 years for the right-wing extremist.

However, such sentences can be extended under Norwegian law for as long as an inmate is considered dangerous. Breivik, a 33-year-old Norwegian on a mission to expel Muslims from Europe, set off a car bomb that killed eight people outside government headquarters in Oslo and then killed 69 others in a shooting rampage on Utoya island, where young members of the governing Labour Party gathered for their annual summer camp.