One year on, Breivik massacre ‘failed to change society’

Norwegians by the thousands gathered at sombre memorials to the 77 people killed a year ago by far-right gunman Anders Behring Breivik to show his bloody rampage had done nothing to change their dedication to an open society.

“The bomb and the shots were intended to change Norway. People responded by embracing our values. He failed, the people won,” prime minister Jens Stoltenberg told the crowds, carrying red and white roses at the memorial in central Oslo.

Breivik, who said his mostly teenage victims were traitors because they supported multiculturalism and Muslim immigration, detonated a bomb outside parliament that killed eight, then shot dead 69 at the ruling Labour Party’s youth camp on Utoeya.