Bomb tears through government HQ in Oslo; 2 dead

[Bad_Daddy 2,209]

http://news.yahoo.com/bomb-tears-government-hq-oslo-2-dead-162809135.html;_ylt=Aj0yaXWBbXuHrSAZUcwG_7B0bBAF;_ylu=X3oDMTM5NHRodGgyBHBrZwNjMmQ4NGRmOC0zZTc0LTNlYTYtOTE4MC02OTA2ZmUyYWI3ZGYEcG9zAzUEc2VjA01lZGlhVG9wU3RvcnkEdmVyA2M2Mzk0ZGUwLWI0ODEtMTFlMC04ZTdkLTVkMDNjZTZhNzNkZg--;_ylg=X3oDMTFxNGdmMG5kBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi11cwRwc3RhaWQDBHBzdGNhdAN3b3JsZHxldXJvcGUEcHQDc2VjdGlvbnM-;_ylv=3

By NILS MYKLEBOST - Associated Press | AP – 33 mins ago

OSLO, Norway (AP) — A powerful bomb tore into the heart of Norway on Friday, killing at least two people and injuring 15 as it ripped open buildings including the prime minister's office. It was the deadliest bombing ever in Oslo, normally associated with the Nobel Peace Prize that is awarded there.

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg was working at home Friday and was unharmed, according to senior adviser Oivind Ostang.

The square where the bomb exploded was covered in twisted metal and shattered glass, and carpeted in documents expelled from the surrounding buildings, which house government offices and the headquarters of some of Norway's leading newspapers. Most of the windows were shattered in the 20-floor high rise where the prime minister and his administration works.

Oslo police said the explosion was caused by "one or more" bombs, but declined to speculate on who was behind the attack. They later sealed off the nearby offices of broadcaster TV 2 after discovering a suspicious package.

"So far, police cannot say anything about the scope of the damage, aside from that there's been one or several explosions," a police statement read.

An AP reporter who was in the office of Norwegian news agency NTB said the building shook from the blast and all employees evacuated as the alarm went off. Down in the street, he saw one person with a bleeding leg being led away from the area.

Public broadcaster NRK showed video of a blackened car lying on its side amid the debris.

Witness Ole Tommy Pedersen was standing at a bus stop 100 meters (yards) from the government high-rise at 3:30 p.m. (1330 GMT) when the explosion occurred.

"I saw three or four injured people being carried out of the building a few minutes later," Pedersen told AP.

The blast comes as Norway grapples with a homegrown terror plot linked to al-Qaida. Two suspects are in jail awaiting charges.

Last week, a Norwegian prosecutor filed terror charges against an Iraqi-born cleric for threatening Norwegian politicians with death if he is deported from the Scandinavian country. The indictment centered on statements that Mullah Krekar — the founder of the Kurdish Islamist group Ansar al-Islam — made to various news media, including American network NBC.

Terrorism has also been a concern in neighboring Denmark since an uproar over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad six years ago. Danish authorities say they have foiled several terror plots linked to the 2005 newspaper cartoons that triggered protests in Muslim countries. Last month, a Danish appeals court on Wednesday sentenced a Somali man to 10 years in prison for breaking into the home of the cartoonist.

Edited July 22, 2011 by Why_Me

[Bad_Daddy 2,209]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/22/us-europe-groups-idUSTRE76L3P120110722

Norway attack: Likely suspected groups

LONDON | Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:50am EDT

(Reuters) - A massive bomb shattered Norway's main government building in Oslo Friday, killing two people, police were quoted as saying by local news agency NTB.

There was no claim of responsibility, though NATO member Norway has been the target of threats, if not bombs, before, notably over its involvement in conflicts in Afghanistan and Libya. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg was safe, NTB said.

Here are details of some of the Islamist militant groups with a record of links to plots in Europe.

* AL QAEDA:

-- Al Qaeda is seen as the militant group that poses the more serious international threat because it is has highly experienced bombmakers and a long-established transnational networks of financial, logistical and ideological support.

-- Though the militant group led by Osama bin Laden was weakened after the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, it has survived by deepening its alliances to local militants in the Afghan-Pakistan border area where he is believed to be hiding and by cultivating affiliate groups in other regions.

-- In an audiotape released in January 2010, bin Laden claimed responsibility for the December 25 attempted bombing of a U.S-bound plane and said it was a continuation of al Qaeda policy since the September 11 attacks.

* ISLAMIC MOVEMENT OF UZBEKISTAN:

-- The IMU emerged from the Fergana Valley in Uzbekistan and has also fought in Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan with the aim of establishing an Islamic Caliphate.

-- With many of its supporters holed up in the tribal areas of Pakistan, it has forged close links with al Qaeda.

-- Earlier this month intelligence sources said there was a plot against European targets reportedly originating with a group in mountainous northern Pakistan, some of them believed to be European citizens.

-- One security official in Germany said word of the plot had probably come from the interrogation of a German-Afghan suspect in Afghanistan. The suspect was identified by media as Ahmed Sidiqi, a German of Afghan origin and IMU member.

- German media said he came from Hamburg and had been held in the U.S. military prison of Bagram in Afghanistan since July.

-- Counter-terrorism expert Guido Steinberg said Sidiqi was a member of a cell of militants from Hamburg that was believed to be a central component of the conspiracy and he said that the cell left for Pakistan in March 2009 and joined the IMU.

* LASHKAR-E-TAIBA/JAISH-E-MOHAMMED:

-- Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed are militant groups based in Pakistan's Punjab province and once nurtured by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency to fight India in Kashmir. They have since been banned.

-- Western security sources say both are obvious points of contact for Europeans traveling to Pakistan seeking help to travel to the tribal areas to join up with al Qaeda.

-- Lashkar-e-Taiba, blamed for the attack on Mumbai that killed 166 people, has generally focused on Kashmir and India, though it has been linked in the past to some plots in the west.

-- David Headley, an American arrested in Chicago in 2009, has pleaded guilty of working with Lashkar-e-Taiba to plot attacks in India, including surveillance of targets in Mumbai.

Headley is also charged with plotting a revenge attack on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed in 2005.

-- LeT's humanitarian wing, the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, enjoys support in the Pakistani Diaspora and security sources have said they feared LeT could exploit this network to facilitate an al Qaeda-inspired attack on the west.

-- Jaish-e-Mohammed has also been linked to plots in the west. It is seen as closer to al Qaeda than Lashkar-e-Taiba.

* AL SHABAAB:

-- Al Shabaab, which means "Youth" in Arabic, has taken control of large areas of south and central Somalia. The Horn of Africa nation has been mired in anarchy since warlords toppled military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

-- Somali officials said the bomber who killed 22 people, including three government ministers, at a graduation ceremony in December 2009 was a 26-year-old Danish citizen of Somali descent. One of the bombers that struck an African Union base in September 2009 was reportedly from Seattle, while about 20 young men were said to have disappeared from Minneapolis's large Somali community in the last two years to join al Shabaab.

-- Shabaab's external reach has been highlighted after January 2010's attack on cartoonist Kurt Westergaard in Copenhagen, as well as its pledge to support Yemeni insurgents linked to al Qaeda who are believed to be behind the foiled Christmas Day bombing of a commercial airliner over Detroit.

-- It also claimed responsibility for the attack in Uganda in July 2010 when bombers killed 79 people in Kampala at venues packed with fans watching the World Cup final.

TEHRIK-E-TALIBAN PAKISTAN:

-- The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistani Taliban, is the group most influenced by al Qaeda and focuses on attacking the Pakistani state, which it considers illegitimate.

-- The TTP claimed responsibility for an attack in Mohmand, a Pashtun region on the northwestern border with Afghanistan which killed 102 people and wounded at least 80.

-- Earlier this month a British man, Abdul Jabbar, reportedly killed by a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan, had ties with the would-be Times Square bomber, Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani intelligence official said. The man had also been in the process of setting up a branch for the Taliban in Britain.

-- The TTP in September had threatened attacks on the United States and Europe. Shahzad was the closest it came to success.

* AQIM:

-- Led by Abdelmalek Droukdel, AQIM burst onto the public stage in January 2007, a product of the rebranding of fighters previously known as Algeria's Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC).

-- The Salafists had waged war against Algeria's security forces but in late 2006 they sought to adopt a broader jihadi ideology by allying themselves with al Qaeda.

-- Security officials were particularly concerned that rebels, who belong to AQIM, could use cash from drug smuggling to recruit new fighters and finance violent attacks.

-- U.S. officials have said traffickers use the Sahara as a staging post for flying illegal drugs from South America into Europe and that AQIM could also tap into the smugglers' network of aircraft and secret landing strips.

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I doubt Gabriel Byrne, Benicio Del Toro or Kevin Spacey are into bombings these days. I could be wrong...

[Obama 2012 1,714]

There's some irony to bombings in Oslo and the Nobel Peace Prize.....

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Not particularly

[Obama 2012 1,714]

Not particularly

The peace price is ironic in itself due to the nature of Alfred Nobel and dynamite...

now add the bombing to the city where the ceremony takes place...

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

That's not irony

[mawilson 2,133]

I doubt Gabriel Byrne, Benicio Del Toro or Kevin Spacey are into bombings these days. I could be wrong...

Kevin Pollack, on the other hand, looks kind of Middle-Eastern.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

.

Edited July 22, 2011 by fishdude

[Glyn and Kathy 288]

Today they are saying it was a blonde haired, blue eyed, Christian Fundamentalist.

[thongd4me 69]

My heart goes out to the families of the Norwegian tragedy -

Friday's events were indirectly foreseen in the journalism and research of Stieg Larsson (Sweden)

regarding right-wing extremism in Scandinavia. Many not having read his work were taken by surprise.

Terrorism can't be excused by any flavor of political dogma.

More recent news

Edited July 23, 2011 by thongd4me

[ONA 133]

Terrible.

If there are bombings in Scandinavia, there is no safe place on this planet left...

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Today they are saying it was a blonde haired, blue eyed, Christian Fundamentalist.

As JG said, the usual suspects.

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

BBC is reporting the initial suspect was of course, middle eastern terrorism.