Oslo – Norwegian police said on Friday they had issued an international arrest warrant for a second suspect in a June shooting that killed two people near a gay bar in central Oslo.
The suspect is a Norwegian in his 40s who had already shown up on police radar and is suspected of “complicity in a terrorist act”, Borge Enoksen, a police official, told a press conference.
Police think the man is currently abroad, but did not provide any more details.
According to TV2, the suspect is Arfan Bhatti, a 44-year-old Islamist with prior convictions who is thought to be in Pakistan, which does not have an extradition treaty with Norway.
Norwegian police said on Friday they had issued an international arrest warrant for a second suspect in a June shooting that killed two people near a gay bar in central Oslo. https://t.co/UVjsy0y6AV
— The Local Norway (@TheLocalNorway) September 23, 2022
On June 25, Zaniar Matapour, 43, is alleged to have opened fire near a gay bar in central Oslo in the early morning hours, amid celebrations linked to the city’s Pride festival.
The shooting killed two men, aged 54 and 60, and wounded 21 others, with Matapour quickly arrested.
Matapour, a Norwegian of Iranian origin, had been known to Norway’s PST intelligence service since 2015, with concerns about his radicalisation and membership of “an extremist Islamist network”.
Norway’s domestic intelligence service has previously described the attack as “an act of Islamist terrorism” and said Matapour had “difficulties with his mental health”.
He is currently at a psychiatric hospital for court-ordered mental evaluation.
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Source: AFP
Picture: Twitter/@joeyMjahed
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