Two people killed in shooting at Oslo’s gay bar

Two people were killed and many others wounded in shootings at a gay bar and surrounding streets in Oslo on Saturday.

According to TheGuardian, the shooting happened at about 1 a.m local time (23:00 GMT on Friday), outside the London Pub — a popular gay bar and nightclub — in the centre of the Norwegian capital. 

The Norwegian city’s police said it has arrested a 42-year-old man and charged him with murder, attempted murder and terrorist acts after the ugly incident. 

Police officials said the man is a Norwegian citizen of Iranian origin.

“I saw a man arrive with a bag, he picked up a gun and started to shoot,” Olav Roenneberg, a journalist at public broadcaster NRK, said.

One witness in the London Pub told NRK that he had been hit by flying glass.

“I was in the outer bar in London when it happened. I just noticed that a shot was fired, and I was hit by a shard of glass. There were more and more and more shots, so I escaped into the inner bar and tried to get as many as possible with me,” he said.

“At first people did not understand what was happening, but then there was panic.”

Oslo was due to hold its annual Pride parade today, just months after Norway marked 50 years since the abolition of a law that criminalised gay sex.

Jonas Gahr Støre, Norwegian prime minister, described it as a “terrible and deeply shocking attack on innocent people” in a Facebook post.