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Norway bus killer sent to psychiatric ward

Richard Orange
Richard Orange - [email protected]
Norway bus killer sent to psychiatric ward
The Valdres Express after another hijack in 2003 - Scanpix

The asylum seeker who stabbed three people to death on a bus in Norway on Sunday has been admitted to a psychiatric hospital for treatment, his lawyer Fredrik Bergen said on Wednesday.

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The 30-year-old South Sudanese man was on Tuesday transferred to Bergen's Sandviken psychiatric hospital.  Initially, he was sent for a day of observation, but doctors are now believe he may need longer psychiatric care. 
 
"He will remain at Sandviken while doctors believe he has the need for treatment there," Fredrik Verling, the man's lawyer said.  "I've had a brief and straightforward conversation with him. He is polite, quiet and friendly." 
 
He said the man had some difficulty communicating as a result of self-inflicted injuries to his throat, which are also being treated. 
 
Police will on Thursday ask a Bergen to allow them to keep the man under arrest for four weeks in the first custody hearing.  It is unclear whether the man will be able to attend. 
 
The man mounted his attack shortly after entering the Valdres Express bus, and is accused of killing the bus driver, Arve Haug Bagn (55) and Margaret Molland Sanden, a 19-year-old biotechnology student at the Oslo and Akerhus University College of Applied Sciences. The third victim,  a Swedish man in his 50s, has not been named. 
 
The asylum seeker was due to be deported to Spain on Tuesday, the day after his attack. 
 
South Sudan's ambassador to Norway, Bol Wek Agoth, said the man claimed to be from the Mayom district of South Sudan's Unity State. 
 
"This is a very tragic and painful incident. My thoughts go first to those who have been affected and who are left with a great sadness at having lost loved ones," he said. 
 
Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg on Wednesday confirmed that her government will set up a network of special centres for rejected asylum seekers, who she said were "disruptive". 
 
"Those who have received a rejection of their application and are awaiting deportation, are more mentally unstable because they have been rejected," she told VG. "It is difficult to put people people who have been rejected together with those who have not been rejected." 

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