OSLO — A person armed with a bow and arrow went on a rampage in a Norwegian city exterior Oslo on Wednesday, killing 5 folks and wounding two others within the deadliest assault in Norway in a decade, the authorities mentioned.
A suspect was reported to be in custody after the assault in Kongsberg, a city of 26,000 folks about 50 miles southwest of Oslo. However the killings left a rustic the place homicide is uncommon, and the police normally unarmed, on edge, as Norwegians waited to be taught what had occurred — and why.
“The incident has left us all shaken,” mentioned Prime Minister Erna Solberg. “The information is terrifying. I perceive that individuals are getting scared.”
The authorities mentioned that they had but to ascertain a motive. “I emphasize that we have no idea whether it is terror or not,” Ms. Solberg mentioned.
The Kongsberg police chief, Oyvind Aas, mentioned investigators weren’t looking for accomplices. “The knowledge we now have, this individual carried out these actions alone,” he advised reporters.
The assault started shortly after 6 p.m., when the assailant started making his approach by the middle of the city. Residents have been urged to hunt shelter inside. A half-hour later, police mentioned, a suspect had been arrested.
The assault additionally mobilized public officers and providers nationwide. Hospitals have been placed on alert, and so was the Justice Ministry. Throughout the nation, the Norwegian police got authorization to hold weapons “as a result of critical incident in Kongsberg,” the authorities mentioned in a statement late Wednesday.
Officers described it as a precaution. “The police at present haven’t any concrete indications that there’s a change within the risk stage within the nation,” the assertion mentioned.
The authorities didn’t instantly launch details about the suspect.
“It’s pure to think about if it’s a terror occasion,” Chief Aas mentioned at a information convention, including that it was “too quickly to say for positive what the person’s motivation is.”
The assailant ranged over a broad swath of the town, leaving investigators with an in depth crime scene to scour. One witness, Kjetil Stormark, who’s editor of a nationwide safety information web site, mentioned the police had secured a grocery store the place a part of the assault was mentioned to have taken place and a bit of a avenue.
The authorities mentioned they have been trying into whether or not one other weapon, a knife, might also have been used within the assaults.
An off-duty police officer who was not in uniform was amongst these injured within the assault, the authorities mentioned.
Homicide is uncommon in Norway. In a rustic with a inhabitants of a bit greater than 5 million, there have been 31 murders in 2020, most involving individuals who knew each other.
However the assault Wednesday got here simply months after Norwegians marked a somber anniversary: One decade in the past, the nation suffered its deadliest assault since World Warfare II. In July 2011, a right-wing extremist detonated a bomb in Oslo after which went on a taking pictures rampage at a political summer season camp for younger folks on the small island of Utoya. Dozens have been killed.
Within the years because the bloodbath, Norway has struggled to reckon with the trauma and been compelled to grapple with painful questions of what may trigger a person to veer so removed from the democratic rules that, together with income from fossil gasoline, have given Norwegians one of many world’s highest requirements of dwelling.
Whereas that was the worst such episode within the largely peaceable nation, slightly over two years in the past, a younger man was charged with tried homicide after he entered a mosque close to Oslo armed and carrying physique armor and a helmet. He was overpowered by a worshiper.
The Norwegian authorities have expressed concern that not sufficient is being finished to root out right-wing extremism, particularly amongst younger folks. In July, analysts with the nation’s intelligence providers warned {that a} decade after the Utoya assault, there are younger males and boys who idolize the gunman.
On Wednesday, as helicopters hovered over Kongsberg and investigators labored their approach by the streets, residents expressed horror and disbelief that their nation, and this time their hometown, could possibly be the goal of such violence.
“This can be a tragedy, fully horrible,” mentioned Mayor Kari Anne Sand. “That is the type of factor you imagine can not occur in Kongsberg. Now we simply should deal with it in the very best method potential.”
Melissa Eddy contributed reporting.