NEWS: Over 70 dead after bomb and gun attack in Norway

The blast is thought to have caused damage to the offices of Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and a number of other official buildings.

Initial reports suggested Mr Stoltenberg was unharmed.

At least eight people were injured in the city centre explosion, local media reports. No-one has said they were behind the attack.

Television footage from the scene showed rubble and glass from shattered windows in the streets - smoke was around some buildings. The wreckage of at least one car was in street.

All roads into the city centre have been closed, said the NRK newspaper.

Oistein Mjarum, head of communications for the Norwegian Red Cross, said his offices were close to the blast.

"There was a massive explosion which could be heard over the capital Oslo."

Mr Mjarum said there were fires burning in the 17-storey prime minister's building.

Eyewitness Ole Tommy Pedersen said he was standing at a bus stop about 100m away from the blast.

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

He said there was a cloud of smoke billowing from the lower floors.

An NRK journalist, Ingunn Andersen, said the headquarters of tabloid newspaper VG had also been damaged.

"I see that some windows of the VG building and the government headquarters have been broken. Some people covered with blood are lying in the street," Associated Press news agency quoted him as saying.

"It's complete chaos here. The windows are blown out in all the buildings close by."

At least 85 people died when a gunman opened fire at the Utoeya camp on Friday, hours after a blast in the government quarter killed seven. Another four are missing on the island.

A 32-year-old Norwegian man was charged over both attacks, but police say it is possible another person was involved.

The suspect surrendered when approached by police officers, they said.

Police chief Sveinung Sponheim said they took 45 minutes to reach the island, and the gunman was apprehended 45 minutes after that.

Mr Sponheim added that there were still bodies or body parts in buildings damaged by the Oslo blast, which he confirmed was caused by a car bomb.

However, the buildings were currently too fragile and dangerous to search, and there were still undetonated explosives there, the police chief said.

It was possible the total death toll from the two attacks could rise to 98, he said.

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg comforted victims and relatives alongside King Harald, Queen Sonja and Crown Prince Haakon in the town of Sundvollen near the island.

Mr Stoltenberg said he was "deeply touched" by the meetings.

"We will do whatever we can to give them as much support as possible," he said.

Thousands of people have come to the perimeter of the government quarter in downtown Oslo where the bomb went off on Friday. They have come to have a look at the destruction, lay flowers and many are just standing in silence. Churches across the city and the entire country have opened their doors and many are packed.

The area is still cordoned off and the army is manning many checkpoints - a sight never seen before in this normally peaceful city.

The downtown square which is overlooked by the now ruined building housing the PM's office would normally be crowded with people enjoying a drink and the sunshine - instead it is blocked off and the only people here are soldiers, police and those clearing the broken glass and rubble. It will be some time before this city gets back to some sort of normality.

King Harald said: "It's now important that we stand together and we support each other and we do not let fear conquer us."

Vektrix wrote:Erm... why?

Just saw a tweet about how 20 people were shot at a youth camp - linked to this apparently.

Andeavor wrote:

Vektrix wrote:Erm... why?

Just saw a tweet about how 20 people were shot at a youth camp - linked to this apparently.

I was just about to say...

The world is going mad, really.

Andeavor wrote:I think it may have been a left/right issue. I'm just going by fragments of information I remember from rifling through some pages but wasn't it a political camp led by young members of the current majority party of Norway?

Andeavor wrote:I think it may have been a left/right issue. I'm just going by fragments of information I remember from rifling through some pages but wasn't it a political camp led by young members of the current majority party of Norway?

bmpalmann wrote:Terrorists with racial prejudices often tend to fail in hitting the people they want to hit and whichever way it goes the innocent will always end up as the victims of hate no matter who they are and where they come from, it ends up being the same all round the world. Stories like this are just plain sad...

Iroh wrote:Yesterdays attack was "the most deadly in the history by one person" if he acted alone, which many newspapers and people here in Norway are starting to speculate about, really put things in a perspective...

I spoke to a friend of mine, which is a young, promising local politician and classmate, he apparently knew several of the victims fairly well, despite being a member of the most conservative party in Norway. I also have several friends in common with other victims apparently.

Norway is a small country, just over 5 million inhabitants, almost everyone is affected by this. This attack is actually bigger then 9/11 if you take the number of causalities compared to the number of inhabitants.

Andeavor wrote:
I do agree that this attack is the 9/11 of Norway. However, many people across the globe lost someone during the fall of the twin towers, which marked a change in both US and international politics.

Norway is a small country, just over 5 million inhabitants, almost everyone is affected by this. This attack is actually bigger then 9/11 if you take the number of causalities compared to the number of inhabitants.