Anders Behring Breivik wants to tell Norway and the World why he killed at least 93 people in a bomb attack and shooting rampage when he appears in court on Monday, his lawyer said.Calling himself a crusader against a tide of Islam in a rambling 1,500-page online manifesto, the 32-year-old mass murderer wants the opportunity to explain actions he deemed "atrocious, but necessary".
Lawyer Geir Lippestad said his client had admitted to Friday's shootings at a Labor youth camp and a bomb that killed seven people in Oslo's government district, but that he denies any criminal guilt.
t was not clear how long Breivik will have to talk in court since the hearing will be about custody and he will not be required to enter a guilty or innocent plea.Police on Monday played down a report in Norwegian media they had already decided to asked for the hearing, in which a judge is set to remand him in custody, to be held behind closed doors.
“It’s up to the judge to decide. It’s not uncommon that the police will ask for it in advance but I don’t know if the police will ask for that,” Liv Corneliussen, a police prosecutor, told Reuters.who has shaken the nation’s psyche the right to speak out.
“He explains himself fairly calmly, but every now and then expresses emotion,” Lippestad said. “He buries his head in his hands.”
“He has said that he believed the actions were atrocious, but that in his head they were necessary,” he said, adding his client did not feel he deserved punishment.
The worst peacetime massacre in the normally placid country’s modern history appears to have been driven by Breivik’s mission to save Europe from what he sees as the threats of Islam, immigration and multi-culturalism.Police have said a trial could be a year away.
Under Norwegian law, a suspect can be sentenced to a maximum of 21 years in jail, but that can be extended if courts decide there is a risk of repeat offences.
"In theory he can be in jail for the rest of his life," said professor of criminal law at the University of Oslo, Staale Eskeland.
Norway will also stop for a minute of silence at midday (1000 GMT) and there will be a torch-lit procession in the evening. Norwegian markets will also reopen on Monday, but bureaucrats whose offices have been wrecked will have to go to alternative offices.
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