Norway’s encounter with terror

Following today’s bombing and shootings in Norway, Bibhu Prasad Routray writes:

In July 2011, Norway brought terror charges against Najm al-Din Faraj Ahmad alias Mullah Krekar, the founder of the outlawed Kurdistan Islamic group of Ansar al-Islam after he threatened former Norwegian asylum minister Erna Solberg. In media interviews Krekar had said that if he is deported to Iraq and killed there, they would face the same fate.

Iraqi born Mulla Krekar had come to Norway as a refugee in the early 1990s and spent years secretly shuttling between Oslo and Kurdistan until his arrest in September 2002. Although terrorism charges were dropped in 2003, he has been officially declared a threat to national security and placed under house arrest awaiting deportation to Iraq. In 2005, Norway issued a deportation order for Mullah Krekar.

The verdict, however, was suspended for fear that the cleric may face execution or torture at home. Krekar had justified the 9/11 attacks saying that the Americans deserved them. The Ansar al-Islam is suspected of having carried out suicide bombings against coalition forces and Iraqi security forces in Iraq.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Facebooktwittermail

3 thoughts on “Norway’s encounter with terror”

  1. Colm O' Toole

    Via: Telegraph (UK)
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8655801/Norway-attacks-who-is-responsible.html

    Hours later there was a summer camp youth conference of the ruling Labour Party, which is being attended by current Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg. The conference is taking place on the island of Utøya. The man apparently infiltrated the conference on the pretence that he had been sent by the police as a security measure in the wake of the Oslo explosions. As such, it is likely he was ethnically Norwegian. This could indicate the involvement of a far-right group rather than an Islamist group.

    Personally I wouldn’t be surprised if it was either Gaddaffi or far-right groups. Not sure about a jihadist connection. After all Aftenposten, Dagbladet and Magazinet were the 3 newspapers in Oslo that published the cartoons of Mohammad. I’d imagine if Jihadists were planning multiple attacks on Norway that at least 1 of these publications would be included.

    Seems to me this was a personal attack against the government. Usual Jihad tactics would be public transportation or high density civilian areas. This attack seemed to be an attempt to directly take out the Prime Ministers office in one location and assassinate the Prime Minister in another location.

  2. Steve

    While condeming this attack on a personal level as I do all attacks by all who kill civilians. I don’t think any country participating in the Nato invasion of Afghanistan nor the blatantly reprehensible wholesale bombing of Libya should be surprised that the people they are slaughtering will stike back.

    I think this shows that there is always a price to pay for acquiescing to killing of fellow human beings.

  3. Steve

    With the news that it was an obviously ill single person who carried out this attack I retract the above post as inaccurate. However I stand by the sentiment expressed regarding the presence of Nato in both Afghanistand and Libya.

Comments are closed.