Skip to main content

Norway marks ten years since Breivik massacre

In Norway, on Wednesday, July 21, commemorative events are held to remember the events ten years ago, when killer Anders Breivik took the life of 77 people, French news agency AFP and news portal France 24 report.


On July 22, 2011, Anders Breivik, detonated a fertiliser bomb outside a government building in Oslo, killing eight persons.

Then he took a ferry to the island of Utoya, located in a lake northwest of the capital owned and run by the youth league of Norway’s Labour Party, and dressed in a self-made police uniform tracked and gunned down 69 people, mostly teenagers and injured 110 more. 

Police finally arrived and arrested him.

➤ Anders Breivik | Find related content here

Subsequently, the killer was handed the maximum sentence – 21 years in prison, which can be extended indefinitely, AFP and France 24 report.

Norway’s July 22, 2011, terror attack: a timeline


STAVANGER, Norway (AP) — A timeline of the events of July 2011, when Anders Behring Breivik attacked the Norwegian government and a Labor youth camp on the island of Utoya, killing a total of 77 people, and the court proceedings that followed:

July 22, 2011

2:09 p.m. — Anders Breivik sends a manifesto, “2083 – A European Declaration of Independence” to 1,002 email addresses including Norwegian politicians and journalists.

3:17 p.m. — Breivik parks a white van outside the government quarter in Oslo, loaded with a 950-kilogram bomb, then leaves in a separate vehicle heading for Utoya island.

3:25 p.m. — The bomb explodes, killing six women and two men.

5:17 p.m. — Breivik arrives in Utoya on a boat from the mainland, dressed as a policeman and carrying an arsenal of weapons in a suitcase

5:21 p.m. — The shooting starts. Breivik kills a guard and a camp organizer before stalking and murdering mostly teenagers and young adults around the island. He kills 69 people.

6:34 p.m. — Breivik gives himself up to armed police and is arrested

April 16, 2012 — The trial begins with Breivik entering the court giving a clenched fist salute. The court will decide if he is sane, and capable of facing justice.

August 24, 2012 — Breivik is sentenced to the maximum 21 years in prison. He will serve his sentence in a high security three-room cell, with access to a gym and computer games, but very little contact with other inmates.

July 2015 — Breivik begins proceedings to sue the Norwegian state for violations of human rights

March 15, 2016 — Breivik returns to court in a special prison facility, for the beginning of the hearing. He enters, giving a Nazi salute

April 20, 2016 — The Oslo district court rules that Breivik’s imprisonment violates article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits inhuman or degrading treatment. The government says it will appeal

March 1, 2017 — An appeals court overrules the previous decision

June 21, 2018 — The European Court of Human Rights rejects Breivik’s appeal

Sources: Agence France-Presse, The Associated Press, Staff, July 21-19, 2021


🚩 | Report an error, an omission, a typo; suggest a story or a new angle to an existing story; submit a piece, a comment; recommend a resource; contact the webmaster, contact us: deathpenaltynews@gmail.com.


Opposed to Capital Punishment? Help us keep this blog up and running! DONATE!



"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde

Most viewed (Last 7 days)

Tennessee executes Harold Wayne Nichols

Thirty-seven years after confessing to a series of rapes and the murder of Karen Pulley, Nichols expressed remorse in final words Strapped to a gurney in the execution chamber at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution Thursday morning, Harold Wayne Nichols made a final statement.  “To the people I’ve harmed, I’m sorry,” he said, according to prison officials and media witnesses. “To my family, know that I love you. I know where I’m going to. I’m ready to go home.”

USA | Should Medical Research Regulations and Informed Consent Principles Apply to States’ Use of Experimental Execution Methods?

New drugs and med­ical treat­ments under­go rig­or­ous test­ing to ensure they are safe and effec­tive for pub­lic use. Under fed­er­al and state reg­u­la­tions, this test­ing typ­i­cal­ly involves clin­i­cal tri­als with human sub­jects, who face sig­nif­i­cant health and safe­ty risks as the first peo­ple exposed to exper­i­men­tal treat­ments. That is why the law requires them to be ful­ly informed of the poten­tial effects and give their vol­un­tary con­sent to par­tic­i­pate in trials. Yet these reg­u­la­tions have not been fol­lowed when states seek to use nov­el and untest­ed exe­cu­tion meth­ods — sub­ject­ing pris­on­ers to poten­tial­ly tor­tur­ous and uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly painful deaths. Some experts and advo­cates argue that states must be bound by the eth­i­cal and human rights prin­ci­ples of bio­med­ical research before using these meth­ods on prisoners.

Georgia parole board suspends scheduled execution of Cobb County death row prisoner

The execution of a Georgia man scheduled for Wednesday has been suspended as the State Board of Pardons and Paroles considers a clemency application.  Stacey Humphreys, 52, would have been the state's first execution in 2025. As of December 16, 2025, Georgia has carried out zero executions in 2025. The state last executed an inmate in January 2020, followed by a pause due to COVID-19. Executions resumed in 2024, but none have occurred this year until now. Humphreys had been sentenced to death for the 2003 killings of 33-year-old Cyndi Williams and 21-year-old Lori Brown, who were fatally shot at the real estate office where they worked.

Oklahoma board recommends clemency for inmate set to be executed next week

A voting board in Oklahoma decided Wednesday to recommend clemency for Tremane Wood, a death row inmate who is scheduled to receive a lethal injection next week at the state penitentiary in McAlester.  Wood, 46, faces execution for his conviction in the 2001 murder of Ronnie Wipf, a migrant farmworker, at an Oklahoma City hotel on New Year's Eve, court records show. The recommendation was decided in a 3-2 vote by the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board, consisting of five members appointed by either the governor or the state's top judicial official, according to CBS News affiliate KWTV. Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Sitt will consider the recommendation as he weighs whether to grant or deny Wood's clemency request, which would mean sparing him from execution and reducing his sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

China | Former Chinese senior banker Bai Tianhui executed for taking US$155 million in bribes

Bai is the second senior figure from Huarong to be put to death for corruption following the execution of Lai Xiaomin in 2021 China has executed a former senior banker who was found guilty of taking more than 1.1 billion yuan (US$155 million) in bribes. Bai Tianhui, the former general manager of the asset management firm China Huarong International Holdings, was executed on Tuesday after the Supreme People’s Court approved the sentence, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

Iran | Child Bride Saved from the Gallows After Blood Money Raised Through Donations, Charities

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); December 9, 2025: Goli Kouhkan, a 25-year-old undocumented Baluch child bride who was scheduled to be executed within weeks, has been saved from the gallows after the diya (blood money) was raised in time. According to the judiciary’s Mizan News Agency , the plaintiffs in the case of Goli Kouhkan, have agreed to forgo their right to execution as retribution. In a video, the victim’s parents are seen signing the relevant documents. Goli’s lawyer, Parand Gharahdaghi, confirmed in a social media post that the original 10 billion (approx. 100,000 euros) toman diya was reduced to 8 billion tomans (approx. 80,000 euros) and had been raised through donations and charities.

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers carry out public execution in sports stadium

The man had been convicted of killing 13 members of a family, including children, and was executed by one of their relatives, according to police. Afghanistan's Taliban authorities carried out the public execution of a man on Tuesday convicted of killing 13 members of a family, including several children, earlier this year. Tens of thousands of people attended the execution at a sports stadium in the eastern city of Khost, which the Supreme Court said was the eleventh since the Taliban seized power in 2021 in the wake of the chaotic withdrawal of US and NATO forces.

Burkina Faso to bring back death penalty

Burkina Faso's military rulers will bring back the death penalty, which was abolished in 2018, the country's Council of Ministers announced on Thursday. "This draft penal code reinstates the death penalty for a number of offences, including high treason, acts of terrorism, acts of espionage, among others," stated the information service of the Burkinabe government. Burkina Faso last carried out an execution in 1988.

Who Gets Hanged in Singapore?

Singapore’s death penalty has been in the news again.  Enshrined in law in 1975, a decade after the island split from Malaysia and became an independent state, the penalty can see people sentenced to hang for drug trafficking, murder or firearms offenses, among other crimes. Executions have often involved trafficking under the Misuse of Drugs Act, with offenses measured in grams.  Those executed have included people from low-income backgrounds and foreign nationals who are sometimes not fluent in English, according to human rights advocates such as Amnesty International and the International Drug Policy Consortium. 

Afghanistan | Two Sons Of Executed Man Also Face Death Penalty, Says Taliban

The Taliban governor’s spokesperson in Khost said on Tuesday that two sons of a man executed earlier that day have also been sentenced to death. Their executions, he said, have been postponed because the heir of the victims is not currently in Afghanistan. Mostaghfer Gurbaz, spokesperson for the Taliban governor in Khost, also released details of the charges against the man executed on Tuesday, identified as Mangal. He said Mangal was accused of killing members of a family.