Emotional Norway PM says 'scale of evil to emerge'

OSLO (AFP) - An emotional Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg told hundreds of mourners at a memorial mass in Oslo Cathedral on Sunday that the scale of the evil of the attacks in Norway was yet to emerge. Stoltenberg said that the names and photographs of those who died, including many members of the youth wing of his Labour Party, would soon be released and "the scale of the evil will then emerge." "We are a small country but we are a proud people," he said as a woman in the congregation sobbed uncontrollably, adding that Norway "will never abandon its values." Stoltenberg addressed a memorial mass for the 92 known victims of Friday's twin bomb and gun attacks, attended by a tearful King Harald V, Queen Sonja and other leaders, saying "each and every one of those who is gone is a tragedy.". Stoltenberg wiped his face with a handkerchief during the service, vowing that despite the tragedy Norway would demonstrate "more democracy, more openness, more humanity, but without naivety." The leader of the Labour Party's youth group, Eskil Pedersen, wept openly after the youth movement he heads was decimated when its summer camp was attacked on Utoeya island. "We are gathered under the signs of mourning and of hope," the bishop of Oslo, Ole Christian Kvarme, told the congregation, many of them wearing black. Hundreds of people had gathered outside the cathedral where a shrine has been set up amid a sea of flowers laid in tribute to those killed in the bombing in Oslo and a mass shooting on a nearby island. Stoltenberg and Pedersen each laid a white rose near the improvised shrine before the service began. Several people are still unaccounted for following the attacks.

ePaper - Nawaiwaqt