The right-wing extremist who killed dozens of teenagers in Norway told police he had originally planned to capture and execute leading Labor Party politicians whom he viewed as traitors, a newspaper reported.
The Norwegian VG tabloid, citing leaked police interrogations with Anders Behring Breivik, reported on Friday that Breivik's aim was to kill former Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland, foreign minister Jonas Gahr Stoere or Eskil Pedersen, head of the Labor Party's youth wing.
But only Pedersen was present when the 32-year-old Norwegian arrived July 22 at the Labor Party youth camp after setting off a bomb that killed eight people in Oslo. Pedersen survived Breivik's attack but 69 other people were killed at the Utoya Island camp.
The newspaper's account paints a picture of a determined killer who planned the attacks in minute detail and who became even more determined to carry out the massacre at Utoya once he realized that the Oslo building he had bombed didn't collapse.
VG said Breivik's initial plan was to take one of the leading Labor Party officials hostage at Utoya and read a death sentence before carrying out an execution. He had prepared a speech for that, which he later recited to investigators, it said.
{{/usCountry}}VG said Breivik's initial plan was to take one of the leading Labor Party officials hostage at Utoya and read a death sentence before carrying out an execution. He had prepared a speech for that, which he later recited to investigators, it said.
{{/usCountry}}Gahr Stoere had visited Utoya the day before, while Brundtland had left the island just hours before Breivik arrived.
VG executives declined to say how the paper obtained the interrogation details. Police, however, released a statement calling it "unfortunate" that classified documents from the investigation had leaked.
It said the documents had been made available to police, defence lawyers and lawyers representing survivors and the families of victims.