By Nora Buli
OSLO, April 13 (Reuters) – Fifteen years after far-right fanatic Anders Behring Breivik detonated a bomb damaging much of Norway’s government quarters, the prime minister and his government on Monday celebrated the return of several ministries to the redeveloped area.
On July 22, 2011, Breivik detonated a car bomb outside the PM’s office, killing eight, before gunning down 69 https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/remembering-norways-attacks-idUKRTX2AUHE/, mostly teenagers, at a Labour Party youth camp on Utoeya island.
The explosion in Oslo caused massive damage to the office tower then housing the PM’s office as well as adjacent government buildings, forcing ministries to move into temporary sites scattered across the city.
Monday marks the official reopening of the quarters following extensive renovations of existing buildings, as well as the construction of new ones.
“We have been in exile,” Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere told reporters on Monday as he showcased his new office for the first time, adding that the return was a historic day.
“It is an important part of history for us: it was the Labour Party that was bombed out of these offices, and it is the Labour Party that is coming back,” he said.
Today, Stoere leads a minority Labour government. At the time of the bombing, he was foreign minister of a Labour-led government of then-prime minister Jens Stoltenberg.
In classic Scandinavian style, Stoere’s office is clad in Norwegian wood and is decorated with artwork representing various Norwegian landscapes.
Stoere brought his own personal touch to the office — a 1995 picture of then South African President Nelson Mandela, looking through the bars of his former prison cell on Robben Island together with ex-Norwegian Prime Gro Harlem Brundtland, Stoere’s former boss.
“This picture is a reminder that we are part of something bigger,” Stoere said.
(Reporting by Nora Buli; Editing by Janane Venkatraman)
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