Police captures extremist who killed 5 using bow and arrows in Norway

Four women and a man were killed while two others wounded when an extremist used a bow and arrow to attack them in Norway.

Thursday, 14th October 2021

Police captures extremist who killed 5 using bow and arrows in Norway

Four women and a man were killed while two others wounded when an extremist used a bow and arrow to attack them in Norway. Police took note of an attack in the city of Kongsberg, southwest of the capital Oslo, at 18:12 local time (16:12 GMT). A Danish 37-year-old man was arrested and questioned during the night hours. Police said they had previously been in contact with him for fear of radicalization after he converted to Islam. The victims were all between 50 and 70 years old, the police chief of the region, Ole Bredrup Saeverud, told reporters on Thursday morning. He said they were most likely dead after police first confronted the attacker at 6:18 p.m. The reports about the incident were 'horrific', Prime Minister Erna Solberg stated hours before she was due to leave office. "I understand that many people are scared, but it is important to emphasize that the police are now in charge," she said. The attacker launched the attack in a Coop Extra supermarket on the west side of Kongsberg. One of the injured was a police officer who was in the store at the time. A spokesman for the chain later confirmed a 'serious incident' at their store, adding that none of their staff was physically injured. Oyvind Aas, local police chief, confirmed that the attacker managed to escape an initial confrontation with the police before an arrest finally took place at 18:47, 35 minutes after the attack began. Norway country profile One witness told local TV2 she heard a shout and saw a woman taking cover, then a man standing on the corner with arrows in a quiver on his shoulder and a bow in his hand ". "After that, I saw people running for their lives. One of them was a woman holding a child by the hand," she added. Police told the Norwegian news agency NTB that the attacker also used other weapons during the incident without giving more information about what it was. The suspect moved over a large area, and authorities cordoned off several parts of the city. Residents were ordered to stay inside so authorities could investigate the scene and gather evidence. Surrounding gardens and garages were searched using sniffer dogs. The attack was the deadliest in Norway since far-right extremist Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people, most of them in a summer camp of the Labor Party for children on the island of Utoya in July 2011. Kari Anne Sand, mayor of Kongsberg, said it was a shocking attack that took place in an area where many people lived and that a crisis team would help everyone affected. She describes the city as "an ordinary community with completely ordinary people" and says that Sanders is "deeply shocked" by this "very tragic situation". The suspect was taken to a police station in the city of Drammen, where his lawyer, Fredrik Neumann, said he had been questioned for more than three hours and was working with the authorities. The suspect had a Danish mother and a Norwegian father, he explained. Norwegian outgoing justice minister Monica Maeland told reporters police did not yet know if it was a terror or not and could not comment on details appearing about the suspect. Ann Irén Svane Mathiassen, the prosecutor of the police, told TV2 that the man had been living in Kongsberg for several years and was known to the police. The attack comes on the last day of Erna Solberg's Conservative government, and a new justice minister will take over the matter on Thursday under a center-left coalition led by Labor leader Jonas Gahr Store. Mr Store said it was a 'horrific and cruel act' hours before announcing his new cabinet. Norwegian police are usually unarmed, and after the attack, the police directorate ordered all officials nationwide to carry firearms as an extra precaution. Police searched the Huseby area in northwest Oslo on Thursday for reports of a man who saw a bow and arrow. Police stressed that no one was injured and that there was no threat.