Mass Killer Breivik Sending Letters to Survivors With Excerpts From His Manifesto

Terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, who is currently serving Norway's longest sentence of 21 years, is still sending numerous letters from prison to his victims and survivors, in which he repeats the message from the manifesto he made before he attacked the government quarter and Utøya in 2011.

Among others, Lisbeth Røyneland, the leader of the 22 July Support Group, who lost her daughter in Breivik's terrorist attack, received a copy of the eight-page printed letter signed by Breivik, which national broadcaster NRK described as "consisting of white power propaganda". Similar letters like this were sent to the Labour Party's Youth League, whose camp Breivik targeted on the island of Utøya, parliamentary representatives and others who hold public positions.

"I reckon he does it to make us react so that he gets attention. But as one left behind, I describe it as harassment. He wants us to know that he is there, and he wants to scare us in a way", Lisbeth Røyneland told national broadcaster NRK. "And it is completely untenable that a mass murderer can send letters to his victims. That is completely unacceptable", she argued.

Labour Party MP and Utøya survivor Torbjørn Vereide also received a letter from his assailant.

"I got a lump in my stomach. I think it was terribly uncomfortable, to be completely honest", Vereide said. "There is something a bit absurd about someone who has pointed a weapon at you and fired and tried to kill you, now sends a letter to you. I felt that my heart stopped a little, and that my day became a little heavy", the MP said, emphasising the importance of countering "verbal swastikas" from the convicted terrorist.

By 2016, Breivik had sent and received around 3,000 letters. However, a court subsequently concluded that a strict control regime was necessary, in order to prevent him from establishing contact with like-minded people outside the prison.

Erling Fæste, the assistant director of the Prison and Probation Service, has pledged to ensure that victims and survivors don't get any letters. He emphasised that the reason why letters are currently allowed is the Execution of Sentences Act which says that prisoners should be entitled to do so, unless it could lead to new criminal offences.

Breivik's defender Øystein Storrvik argued that his client is already under "extremely strict conditions" when it comes to communication with the outside world. "It is difficult to imagine that there is a legal basis for further tightening", he explained.

Vidar Strømme, the director of the Norwegian Institute for Human Rights, argued that the punishment for prisoners is to be deprived of their liberty, but not other rights.

"It is important that you get to use freedom of expression, also in prison. It is a basic principle", Strømme argued. However, he argued, there is a possibility of obtaining a restraining order if there is a danger of personal prosecution.

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Anders Behring Breivik is known as the deadliest mass murderer in Norway's peacetime history for his dual attack against Oslo's government quarter and the Labour Youth Camp on Utøya Island in 2011, which killed 77 and wounded over 150.

Ahead of the attack, which scarred Norway's national psyche, Anders Breivik issued a manifesto against multiculturalism and Islam, in which he also blamed feminism for "Europe's cultural suicide".

Diagnosed with narcissistic and antisocial personality disorder, Breivik has since been serving Norway's harshest sentence of 21 years in solitary confinement.