Norway has violated the human rights of the rightwing extremist Anders Breivik by exposing him to inhuman and degrading treatment during his imprisonment for terrorism and mass murder, a Norwegian court has ruled.



Breivik, who killed 77 people in July 2011 in the country’s worst acts of violence since the second world war, took the Norwegian authorities to court last month, alleging that the solitary confinement in which he had been held for nearly five years breached the European convention on human rights.

Although Breivik is detained in a three-cell complex where he can play video games, watch TV and exercise, judge Helen Andenaes Sekulic of the Oslo district court ruled that the Norwegian state had broken article 3 of the convention.

The prohibition of inhuman and degrading treatment “represents a fundamental value in a democratic society”, she said in a written decision. “This applies no matter what – also in the treatment of terrorists and killers.” The judge ordered the government to pay Breivik’s legal costs of 331,000 kroner (£35,000).

Sekulic decided that Breivik’s right to “correspondence” – a private and family life – had not been violated. The 37-year-old extremist is in principle allowed visits from family and friends, but has not received any apart from his mother before she died.

Brevik had argued during a four-day hearing at the Skien prison 80 miles (130km) from Oslo, where he is serving his sentence, that solitary confinement, as well as frequent strip searches and the fact that he was often handcuffed while moving between cells, violated his human rights.

Breivik, who made a Nazi salute on the opening day of the proceedings but later said he had renounced violence and compared himself to Nelson Mandela, also said isolation was having a negative impact on his health, and complained about the quality of the prison food – including microwaved meals that he described as “worse than water-boarding” – and having to eat with plastic cutlery.

Breivik’s lawyer, Oystein Storrvik, told the Norwegian news agency NTB that the prison authorities must now lift his client’s isolation. Lawyers for the Norwegian state had said before the verdict they would appeal if it went against them, but it was not clear on Wednesday if they would do so.

Norway’s most notorious prisoner was sentenced in August 2012 to a maximum 21-year sentence – which can be extended if he is still considered a danger – for killing eight people in a bomb attack outside a government building in Oslo, then shooting dead another 69, most of them teenagers, on the island of Utøya on 22 July 2011.

Dressed as a police officer, Breivik spent more than an hour methodically hunting down his targets on the small island, where nearly 600 members of the youth wing of the Norwegian Labour party, which he blamed for the rise of multiculturalism in Norway, had gathered for a summer camp. Most of his young victims were killed with a single bullet to the head.

He has been held in isolation since he surrendered to police on the island on the day of the attacks. Government lawyers have said solitary confinement is necessary because Breivik is “extremely dangerous”, and argued the conditions of his imprisonment fall “well within the limits of what is permitted” under the European convention.

But Breivik argued that the government had breached two of the convention’s articles barring “inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” and guaranteeing respect for “correspondence”.

Judges heard that Breivik had one cell for living, another for studying and a third for physical exercise, and that although his visits and contacts with the outside world were strictly controlled, he had been provided with exercise equipment, a DVD player, games console, typewriter and books and newspapers.

His lawyer stressed the case was important because his client would probably spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Doctors, psychiatrists and prison staff who have examined him in prison told the hearing they had seen no significant changes in his physical or mental state that could be attributed to the conditions in which he was being held. Norway prides itself on a humane prison system aimed more at rehabilitation than punishment.

Expressing surprise at the decision, Prof Kjetil Larsen of the Norwegian Institute of Human Rights said he thought it was clear Breivik’s treatment did not violate the convention. “I thought that what came out during the trial made that even clearer,” he said.

