A judge yesterday remanded Anders Behring Breivik, who killed scores of people in a bomb attack and shooting rampage in Norway, into custody for eight weeks after he claimed to have created a network capable of spreading terror.
A short while later, Norwegian police lowered the overall death toll from 93 to 76.
Senior Oslo police official Oeystein Maeland said the number of people killed in the bombing went up one to eight, and that the count from the shooting on a nearby island dropped from 86 to 68.
All the bodies have been removed from the island shooting allowing for a more exact death toll, Maeland said.
"This figure could still go up," he added of the shooting toll, and "the search [bodies] is ongoing."
At a court hearing in Oslo, Breivik said he had “two further cells” in his organization, according to the court registrar.
He had arrived at an Oslo courtroom for a closed custody hearing to jeers from an angry crowd.
“Get out, get out,” shouted Alexander Roeine, 24, banging on the car he believed had brought Breivik to Oslo District Court.
“Everyone here wants him dead,” Roeine said, adding that he knew one of the dead and three survivors of Friday’s attacks.
The 32-year-old was driven in and out of the downtown Oslo courthouse wearing a red pullover, after the judge dismissed his bid to court publicity by wearing a military uniform.
“There is an immediate risk that the accused would tamper with evidence if he were now released,” Judge Kim Heger said after the closed-door hearing.
Breivik will be held in solitary confinement for the first four weeks, with a ban on all communication with the outside world in a bid to aid a police investigation into his acts.
The suspect admitted the facts of the case, but did not enter a guilty plea.
“Despite that the accused has acknowledged the actual circumstances, he has not pleaded guilty,” Heger told reporters, through an official interpreter, after closing off the hearing. “The court finds that out of consideration to the investigation, it is important that the accused not be given the opportunity to communicate with others.”
The prosecution asked for the usual four-week custody limit to be doubled — and for the first four weeks to see Breivik placed in isolation, with a full “ban on letters and visits.”
Police are taking seriously his claim in court to have others ready to act, with a court official saying “police will probe” the claim.
According to his lawyer, Breivik had wanted to explain why he perpetrated modern-day Norway’s worst peace-time massacre, but a judge ruled that the hearing would be a closed session.
Breivik appeared calm and did not try to communicate with journalists standing across the road from an underground garage when he was brought down from the courtroom.
He sat unmovingly in the back seat, with a policeman beside him, his head tilted slightly back, before being whisked away.
Earlier in the day, Norwegians held a minute’s silence for the victims of the self-confessed killer with an anti-immigration agenda.
“In remembrance of the victims ... I declare one minute’s national silence,” Norwegain Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said on the steps of Oslo University, flanked by Norway’s king and queen.
The silence stretched to five minutes as thousands more stood around a carpet of flowers outside nearby Oslo cathedral. Only squawking seagulls and a barking dog broke the silence.
Cars stopped in the streets and their drivers got out and stood motionless as traffic lights changed from red to green.
Breivik allegedly planted a bomb on Friday outside Stoltenberg’s Oslo office, then drove to the island of Utoeya and shot dead people attending a youth camp of the ruling Labor Party.
The 32-year-old declared in a rambling 1,500-page manifesto posted online shortly before the massacre that he was on a self-appointed mission to save Europe from what he saw as the threats of Islam, immigration and multiculturalism.
The judge’s decision to close the hearing to the public followed an outcry from Norwegians enraged at the possibility that Breivik would be allowed a public platform for his views.
Police have said a trial could be a year away. The maximum jail term in Norway is 21 years, although that can be extended if there is a risk of repeat offenses.
Meanwhile, a surgeon at a hospital that treated 35 of the wounded said Breivik may have used “dum-dum” bullets for maximum damage.
In addition, the half brother of Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit, 51-year-old off-duty policeman Trond Bernsten, was one of the people killed on Utoeya, a royal family spokesperson said.
The Verdens Gang daily, citing witnesses, said Bernsten had tried to arrest the gunman after ensuring his son was safe.
Meanwhile, Norway’s preparedness paid off yesterday as a supreme feat of logistics saw work resume at 15 relocated ministries less than three days after a bomb wiped out the physical heart of the government.
This story has been updated since it was first published.
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