The evaluation report after the terrorist attack last year was presented this summer. Zaniar Matapour killed two and injured many when he opened fire with a machine gun in the center of Oslo on the night of Saturday 25 June last year. City council leader Raymond Johansen called the report after the terror “crushing”, while the Conservative Party believed it was “worse than feared”. The ten most central findings It is possible that the attack on the night of 25 June 2022 could have been prevented if PST had opened a preventive case against Zaniar Matapour in the months leading up to the attack. Although PST relied on relevant self-produced intelligence about Matapour, PST did not share this intelligence with the radicalization contacts in the police who were responsible for following him up. It is possible that the attack could have been averted as a result of a notification PST received from the E-service five days before the attack occurred. No one in PST ever checked Bhatti’s social media accounts as a result of the notice from the E-service. The police’s operational handling of the attack, including implementation of the procedure for ongoing life-threatening violence (PLIVO), notification and interaction internally and externally, was on the whole well carried out and in line with current guidelines and procedures. Lack of preparedness/availability for important functions in the Oslo police district still constitutes a limitation for the police’s abilities and opportunities to handle serious crises and incidents. The police authorities entrusted too much communication responsibility to Oslo Pride. There was too little interaction between Oslo police district, PST and the Norwegian Police Directorate about how they should communicate about the attack. The director of police did not have sufficient grounds to review the Oslo police district’s operational assessments of whether the solidarity marking on 27 June could be carried out. The decision to recommend the cancellation of the solidarity marking was contrary to the freedom of assembly according to Section 101 of the Constitution and Article 11 of the ECHR. The report described PST and the police’s handling of the attack, as well as the time before and after. Among other things, the committee criticized PST for not processing a notification from the E-service quickly enough. Now PST has started work on changing routines. Among other things, PST must notify the Norwegian Intelligence Service of new terrorist threats regardless of what time of the day they are discovered. This is shown in a letter from PST to the Ministry of Justice, which news has been given access to. Frictions In the report from the evaluation committee, it emerged that there are frictions between PST and the National Intelligence Service. PST has responsibility for preventing and uncovering domestic terrorism, while the Norwegian Intelligence Service has responsibility outside Norway’s borders. After the attack, it became known that PST was notified by the E-service of a possible imminent terrorist attack – five days before the shooting took place. The e-service considered that the attack was to take place in Norway, and that the well-known extremist Arfan Bhatti was involved. The information came from a Norwegian Islamist, who had revealed the terrorist plans in a chat with an agent. The agent pretended to be an IS fighter, but in reality worked for the E-service. SECRET OPERATION: 19 June 2022, an Islamist tells an agent in the E-service that an attack is being planned, and that it will take place in a Scandinavian country. Photo: Defense Exaggeration and skepticism In the report, PST received criticism for how they handled this warning. The warning was not treated as “time-critical”, and there was an internal disagreement in PST about how serious the warning was. The committee pointed to a culture in the counter-terrorist department of the PST that may have hampered the service’s work: The interaction between the PST and the E-service sometimes shows that both services want to be the best in their field. Some in PST believed that the E-service tended to exaggerate the importance of received information. The work on the notification was one-sided. PST spent efforts to find out whether Arfan Bhatti was really involved, instead of trying to find out who in Norway could attack. The committee believes that one possible reason was a general skepticism about information that came from the E-service. On the other hand, PST has believed that the E-service shared too little information when they notified. The e-service did not say that the information about a possible attack in Norway came from their own secret operation. Nor did they share the chat messages between the agent and the Norwegian Islamist. According to the report, PST believes that the assessment of the degree of seriousness and how urgent it was “obviously” would have changed if they had realized that the E-service had collected the information themselves. Must notify 24/7 The committee recommended that PST further develop its collaboration with the E-service, and wrote that the measures should lead to the services gaining more trust in each other’s assessments. These are the committee’s recommendations. PST’s counter-terrorism department should lower the threshold for creating preventive cases. This, in turn, will require a strengthening of the human resources that work with preventive counter-terrorism activities in PST. Furthermore, PST, in consultation with the Ministry of Justice and Emergency Preparedness, should carry out a separate review of the resource situation for PST’s counter-terrorist work, where the match between available resources and the scope of necessary tasks is central. PST should, to a greater extent, compile, downgrade and share self-produced intelligence about people whom the police are responsible for following up. PST’s counter-terrorism department should further develop its cooperation with the E-service through measures that can create more trust in each other’s assessments. In addition, PST should clarify expectations regarding what can and should be shared of details related to self-obtained information from both PST and the E-service. PST should arrange for analysts in the counter-terrorism department to carry out simple searches in open sources themselves. In addition, PST should develop its expertise in and attention to threatened minority groups in civil society, such as Jews, Muslims and queer people. The police should continue with regular training and practice of the PLIVO procedure in cooperation with the emergency services, including the emergency notification centres. The police should also retain the current routine for media training and media handling responsibility of the incident manager. Furthermore, the committee recommends that the police prioritize maintaining the current frequency of carrying out national exercises and continue the staff and leadership development programme. The Directorate of Police should look at an availability/preparedness arrangement for intelligence, communication and management support for operations managers in the police which gives access to the right expertise at the right time. : In extraordinary incidents such as this, the police agencies should take greater responsibility for communication so that they do not entrust demanding communication tasks to victims and groups in a vulnerable situation. Communication between the Norwegian Police Directorate, PST and Oslo Police District must be improved. This will provide better opportunities to comment on each other’s messages ahead of press conferences and to correct any ambiguities or different approaches before misunderstandings are created in the public. This, in turn, can contribute to increased understanding in the media and in the population of the different roles that different police organizations have, as well as increasing trust in the police authorities in general. The director of police should not review the operational work of the police districts without detailed knowledge of the police district’s understanding of the situation, resource situation and police professional assessments. : The police should not recommend the cancellation of events without assessing security threats in the light of knowledge of security measures in place. When the police recommend the cancellation of events, thorough assessments should be made of whether the recommendations are to be regarded as interference with freedom of assembly, and if so, whether they go further than is necessary to fulfill the purpose. news has now obtained access to a letter from PST to the Ministry of Justice, which shows PST’s “overall plan” for the follow-up of the report. PST has listed 27 measures. Six of them go to the cooperation with the E-service, among other things: PST informs the E-service on an ongoing basis about all counter-terror cases with an international dimension. PST has established routine notifications to the E-service about new terrorist threats regardless of what time of the day they may appear. The services have created a structure for joint threat investigation. They must establish a concept for integrated teams. Read the full letter here: PST’s report to JD about the service’s follow-up of the 25 June evaluation (letter sent 1 August 2023) To exchange personnel news has asked the Norwegian Intelligence Service if they have made changes in the cooperation with PST after the terrorist attack on 25 June last year. Communications manager Ann-Kristin Bjergene writes in an email that it is important to work with three areas to “further improve cooperation”. – These are formal bodies, tighter processes and exchange of personnel. Our aim is to work for a continuous improvement of the collaboration, writes Bjergene. The e-service does not wish to elaborate on this until after the open control hearing in the Storting on 2 October. Better understanding Counter-terror chief Lars Lilleby in PST is responsible for following up the measures within the counter-terror field. CHANGES: We have made structural changes so that we work more consciously with risks and threats, says counter-terrorism chief Lars Lilleby. Photo: Ole Berg-Rusten / NTB The department has been reorganized and two new sections have been created. According to the letter, PST has strengthened its work with open sources. According to Lilleby, “significantly more” people work with counter-terrorism in PST now than before the terrorist attack. He says the collaboration with the E-service is also better. – There is a clearer focus on sharing more, says Lilleby to news. According to Lilleby, PST and the E-service must be closer to each other and at all times have a common understanding of the situation. – Do PST and the E-service now have a common understanding of what information must be shared? – Yes, I would say that. It is probably right that we have a better understanding of what the other person needs in order to actually clarify these threats, says Lilleby to news. – We must be sure that we have understood each other in the right way, and that we understand the information that the individual is sitting on, concludes the counter-terrorism chief. Zaniar Matapour is charged with murder and terror after the fatal shots, while Arfan Bhatti is charged with complicity in aggravated terror. Two other men have been charged with complicity in a terrorist act. All deny criminal guilt.
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Received crushing criticism after terror – this is how PST will clean up – news Norway – Overview of news from various parts of the country
