Anders Breivik brings case to European Court of Human Rights

Anders Breivik brings case to European Court of Human Rights
Breivik has taken his case, concerning his detention conditions, to the European Court of Human Rights. He is claiming that articles 3 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights have been breached.

The neo-Nazi, Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 77 people in 2011 in Norway, has brought his case to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). This is with the express wish for the court to rule upon his detention conditions, which he considers to be “inhuman.” His lawyer announced this on Thursday.

Breivik, who believes that his prison confinement is a violation of his human rights, had exhausted all avenues of redress in Norway. This came as a result of the Supreme Court, the highest court in the country’s legal system, refusing to consider his appeal at the beginning of the month.

As his lawyer, Øystein Storrvik, announced, he has applied to the ECHR in Strasbourg, on his client’s behalf, considering that Breivik’s prison regime violates articles 3 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The first prohibits all “degrading” or “inhuman” treatment and the second guarantees the right to respect for private life and personal correspondence. Mr Storrvik told the AFP (Agence France Presse) news agency that the application, sent on Thursday, essentially revolves around the issue of his solitary confinement.

The Norwegian state rejected the allegations around his solitary confinement and emphasized that Breivik is treated as a “VIP prisoner”, with three generously equipped cells available to him. He also has multiple contacts with prison staff, his lawyer and even a prison visitor. The extremist, aged 38, who has recently changed his name to Fjotolf Hansen, is serving a 21-year prison sentence likely to be prolonged indefinitely.

On July 22nd, 2011, disguised as a policeman, he had tracked participants in a Labour Youth summer camp on the island of Utøya for more than an hour, trapping and killing 69 of them. The majority of these were teenagers. A little earlier, he had killed eight other people by exploding a bomb close to the seat of government in Oslo. He had reproached his victims for paving the way for multiculturalism.


The Brussels Times


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