Norway’s oldest and most illustrious university, with five Nobel Prize winners among its alumni, may soon add the self-confessed fascist whose terror campaign two years ago killed 77 people.
Anders Behring Breivik, serving a 21-year sentence in a maximum security prison, has applied to the University of Oslo to study political science, Norwegian television revealed on Monday nigh.
Breivik killed 69 students at a summer camp on Utoya island after a bomb he planted in government offices in Oslo killed eight people.
The university, whose Latin motto is et nos petimus astra (we strive for the stars), said it would consider Breivik’s application “on its merits.”
University rector Ole Petter Ottersen confirmed that Breivik had applied to study a single topic that would not lead to a degree, but could not go into details on how the application would be treated.
“Prison inmates are allowed to study, and we have a set of rules that we stick to in assessing applications. We don’t want to change them — although obviously some people would like them changed,” he said.
Last summer, Breivik announced his intention to study politics and write several books.
National Union of Students in Norway vice president Andre Almas Christiansen said: “I understand that this is sensitive, but we do not comment on individuals. Everyone can apply — it’s up to the university to look after this.”
Many staff at the University of Oslo had “reacted quite negatively” to Breivik’ application, Ottersen said, adding that in the “hypothetical” case that Breivik was admitted, lecturers would have the right to refuse to teach him.
“Should we find ourselves in that situation, we will be very attentive to the problems that could arise and to the views of our teachers,” he said.
The Norwegian Association of Researchers, which represents university teachers, could not be reached for comment.
Despite the reluctance of Norway’s higher education institutions to be drawn on the sensitivities of the case, Breivik’s application to study is likely to be highly controversial.
Per Anders Langerod, who was among the survivors of Breivik’s massacre on Utoya Island and finished a master’s degree in political science at the university last year, said he did not want Breivik there.
“We cannot expect people to accept it,” he told TV2. “[The university] is a place where you learn that you should pursue your opinions with words... You cannot go out and tape over their mouth or shoot them just because you disagree.”
Knut Bjarkeid, director of Ila prison where Breivik is being held, told Norwegian journalists: “The prison will always try to pave the way for the inmates to get a formal education, so that they are able to get a job when they come out.”
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in