Updated at 11:35 a.m. ET: OSLO -- A Norwegian court ruled Friday that confessed mass killer Anders Behring Breivik was sane, deciding he was criminally responsible for the massacre of 77 people last summer.

Reading the ruling, Judge Wenche Elisabeth Arntzen said that "in a unanimous decision ... the court sentences the defendant to 21 years of preventive detention." 

However, such sentences can be extended under Norwegian law as long as an inmate is considered dangerous. Experts have said Breivik is likely to spend the rest of his life behind bars. Norway doesn't have the death penalty.

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Prosecutors had demanded a verdict of insanity, a fate Breivik called "worse than death," while many of his victims had said only a sane person could have carried out such a complex attack. 

Breivik, 33, detonated a fertilizer bomb outside a government building that included the prime ministerial offices last July, killing eight, then gunned down 69 people, mostly teenagers, at the ruling Labor Party's youth camp on Utoya island.

After the ruling, Breivik told the court he would not appeal the decision.

"He is getting what he deserves," Alexandra Peltre, 18, whom Breivik shot in the thigh on Utoya, told Reuters. "This is karma striking back at him. I do not care if he is insane or not, as long as he gets the punishment that he deserves." 

Another survivor of the massacre, Eivind Rindal, told the Norwegian newspaper VG that “it is important that the defendant gets his punishment but the most important thing is that he never gets out.”

“There are many who shared his extreme views in our society,” Rindal added, according to an English translation in the Telegraph newspaper.

Trine Aamodt, whose 19-year-old son was shot at Utoya, told VG she was “happy with the verdict of sanity and am also very glad that there was consensus from all the judges.”

Guilt never a question
Guilt had never been a question in the trial as Breivik described in chilling detail how he hunted down his victims, some as young as 14, with a shot to the body and then one or more bullets to the head.

The killings shook this nation of five million people which had prided itself as a haven from much of the world's troubles, raising questions about the prevalence of far-right views as immigration rises.

Few believe anyone would ever sign Breivik's release papers. One of the reasons Breivik's attacks were presented in such gruesome detail during the trial was so that the horror of Oslo and Utoya would be well-documented for the day Breivik asks to be released.

Czech police accuse man of plotting Norway-like copycat terrorist attack

The court’s ruling actually imposed a minimum sentence of 10 years and a maximum of 21.

But Jo Stigen, a law professor at the University of Oslo, told NBCNews.com that Breivik was unlikely to be released for decades.

“This means as long as he is dangerous he will not be free. It’s a potential life sentence … I can hardly see it will be considered he’s not dangerous in 30 or 40 years,” he said, speaking by phone from outside the court.

After serving the 10-year minimum sentence, Breivik will be evaluated periodically. Stigen said it was “theoretically possible” he could be released in 10 years, but added this was highly unlikely.

After 21 years, the prosecution can seek to have Breivik kept in prison -- Stigen said that “most certainly they will” – and a court will then decide whether to keep the mass killer in prison.

Norway prison seeks 'friends' to play hockey, chess with mass killer Breivik

'Tough year'
The trial and a commission of investigation into the country's worst violence since World War Two have kept Breivik on the front pages for the past 13 months and survivors said the verdict would finally bring some closure.

"It has been a tough year... but I don't want to be Utoya-Nicoline for the rest of my life," said Nicoline Bjerge Schie, a survivor of the shooting, ahead of the verdict.

As a result of the ruling that he is sane, Breivik will be locked up in solitary confinement inside the maximum security Ila prison on the outskirts of Oslo. He will return to his relatively spacious cells, enjoying the comforts of a computer, newspapers and a separate exercise room.

Anders Breivik to Norway court: I killed 77 people but am not guilty

One team of court appointed psychiatrists concluded Breivik was psychotic while another came to the opposite conclusion. To make the ruling more difficult, several other experts who testified described a series of mental conditions Breivik suffered from.

Polls showed that around 70 percent of Norwegians thought such a well-planned attack could not have been the work of a madman and Breivik must take responsibility rather than be dismissed as merely deranged.

Breivik himself argued for a verdict of sanity as he wanted the attack to be seen as a political statement rather than an act of lunacy.

He rejected criminal charges out of principle, saying he doesn't recognize the court's authority because it represents a political system that supports multiculturalism -- the reason why he targeted the Labor Party.

NBC News' Ian Johnston, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Czech authorities say a 29-year-old man suspected of plotting a terrorist bombing was an admirer of Anders Behring Breivik, the man accused of killing 77 people in Norway last year.

The man, who hasn't been identified, was arrested Aug. 10, but the case wasn't made public until Saturday. Police said he has multiple previous convictions for making illegal explosives, at least one of which was used to blow up a small structure.

The man drew the attention of police by using the nickname "Breivik" in posts on Internet sites, authorities said Saturday, the Prague newspaper Czechia Today reported. When they searched his home in Ostrava, they disarmed a booby trap before discovering firearms, ammunition, gas masks and improvised explosive devices, as well as police uniforms, Ostrava Police Chief Radovan Vojta said.

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Police evacuated about 80 people from a block of residences around the building on Aug. 10 without giving any details, the newspaper Ostrava Idnes reported at the time. Neighbors told reporters that they believed the 29-year-old man in the apartment was dangerous.

Investigators said Saturday that now they believed the man was planning to detonate a high-power bomb by remote control. Vojta told Radio Praha that the man was carrying a remote-control detonator when he was arrested and that tests on the presumed bomb showed that it was "functional."

Tomas Tuhy, head of the regional office of national police, said at a news conference Saturday that investigators believed the man "admires the known murderer Anders Breivik of Norway."

Breivik is on trial in Norway after having admitted carrying out two attacks in July 2011 that killed 77 people in Oslo and Utoya. He has drawn sympathy from far-right and neo-Nazi groups across Europe, including in the Czech Republic, where he is believed to have visited to buy weapons.

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Prosecutors asked a Norwegian court on Thursday to declare far-right mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik insane and commit him to a mental institution.

While not certain that Breivik was not responsible for his actions, they chose to give him the benefit of the doubt in the face of conflicting psychiatric reports, and so to go against the view of most Norwegians that he should go to prison.

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"In our opinion, it's worse to send a psychotic person to preventive detention than to send a non-psychotic person to mandatory care," prosecutor Svein Holden told the court.

"We are not convinced that Anders Behring Breivik is legally insane, but we are in doubt. So our petition is for a judgment that he shall be transferred to compulsory mental health care,” he added.

Held indefinitely
If the court agrees with the prosecution's request, Breivik could be held indefinitely, receiving treatment in a secure ward set up in a high-security prison. His presence there would come up for review every three years.

If the court opts for a prison term instead, prosecutors said their preference would be the maximum sentence of 21 years. A sentence can be extended beyond that if a prisoner is considered a menace to society, The Associated Press reported.

Norway prison seeks 'friends' to play hockey, chess with mass killer Breivik

Three out of four Norwegians consider Breivik sane enough for a jail term, according to a poll carried out for the public broadcaster NRK. Many find it hard to understand how someone could be insane and yet spend years planning such a spectacular attack so meticulously.

A pre-trial psychiatric report that found him to be insane created such an outcry that the court ordered another one, which came to the opposite conclusion.

Breivik: I'm sane
Breivik admits to killing 77 people in twin attacks last July, most of them teenagers at a Labour Party summer camp.

He says he should be declared sane, but acquitted on grounds that he was defending the Norwegian people by fighting the supporters of Muslim immigration.

If the court finds him to have been insane, he has said that it will be "worse than death", and he will appeal.

Earlier in the trial, Breivik said the psychiatric dimension of the case was a way for Norwegian authorities to ridicule him and divert attention from his ideology.

Tears as victim's brother throws shoe at Norway mass killer Anders Breivik

Breivik claims Norway and Europe are being colonized by Muslims, who make up about 2 percent of Norway's population. 

He first detonated a bomb outside government headquarters in Oslo to create a diversion, then systematically gunned down 69 people, mostly teenagers, at a summer camp run by the ruling Labour Party on the island of Utoeya.

"What is most incomprehensible is how unaffected he was by his acts," prosecutor Inga Bejer Engh said. "He described without remorse or feeling how these young people begged for their lives, and how he shot them in the head to make sure they were dead."

The trial ends with closing defense arguments on Friday. The two professional and three lay judges are due to reach a verdict by August 24.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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A man identified as the older brother of one of the victims of Norwegian mass killer Anders Behring Breivik threw a shoe at him during his trial Friday, the first time the proceeding has been interrupted by a public outburst. 

"Go to hell, go to hell, you killed my brother," the man, who was seated in the second row of the public gallery, screamed as he threw the shoe at Breivik from a few yards away, newspaper VG reported on its website.  

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The shoe missed Breivik but struck his co-defense lawyer, Vibeke Hein Baera, who was seated closest to the public gallery, during the presentation of an autopsy report. 

"Luckily, it was just a shoe," Hein Baera told the AFP news agency after the incident.

Norwegian media said the man was a brother of one of the victims of Breivik's rampage, but his name was not immediately available. He was removed from the courtroom by police. 

"Some spectators were uncomfortable. Some started crying. Many clapped their hands," Swedish journalist Bjoern Lindahl said, according to the Press Association news agency, which added that the incident contrasted with the usual "polite atmosphere" in the court.

The incident came during a week of harrowing testimony from survivors of Breivik's rampage across the small island of Utoeya last July, where the ruling Labor Party was holding a youth camp. He killed 69 people there, many of them teenagers. 

Breivik has listened calmly to the descriptions of his killings and shown hardly any emotion, except when hearing descriptions about how he was said to have let out "cries of joy" and laughed while shooting, which he has denied. 

Breivik has admitted the killings, but denies criminal responsibility. He says he was defending Norwegian ethnic purity from Muslim immigration and the multiculturalism backed by the Labor Party. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

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OSLO, April 25 (Reuters) - Norwegians protesting against mass killer Anders Behring Breivik will take to the streets of Oslo on Thursday to sing a children’s songs that they're hoping he will just hate.

They plan to sing arm-in-arm a few blocks from the courthouse where Breivik is on trial for the killings of 77 people in a gun and bomb rampage last year.

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"I grew up with this song and have sung it to my child," said Lill Hjoennevaag, one of the organizers of the demonstration.

"Everybody I know feels strongly about this song and we need to take it back," she told public broadcaster NRK.

Lillebjoern Nilsen's "Children of the Rainbow," a Norwegian rendition of American folk singer Pete Seeger's 1971 "My Rainbow Race," is a popular song in Norway.

"Breivik has used it as an example of brainwashing, but it is rather an example of the opposite," said Christine Bar, another organizer, who launched the event on Facebook.

"We think it represents diversity, and it stands for the community we have chosen to live in, and which Breivik and similar people want to tear down," she added.

Breivik, set off a car bomb in the capital Oslo, killing eight people, then gunned down 69 people, mostly teenagers, at a youth summer camp organized by the ruling Labor Party on July 22.

Also on Wednesday, the confessed mass killer slammed a psychiatric report that declared him insane as based on "evil fabrications" meant to portray him as irrational and unintelligent.

Norway's Breivik gives 'terrifying' testimony

"It is not me who is described in that report," the right-wing extremist, who admitted killing 77 people in bomb and shooting attacks on July 22, said in court.

A second psychiatric examination found Breivik sane. The five-judge panel trying Breivik on terror charges for the attacks will consider both reports.

Breivik admits to the bombing of Oslo's government district and subsequent shooting massacre at the Labor Party youth camp, claiming the attacks were "necessary" and that the victims had betrayed Norway by embracing immigration.

Images: Norway mourns after massacre

If found guilty, Breivik would face 21 years in prison, though he can be held longer if deemed a danger to society. If declared insane, he would be committed to compulsory psychiatric care.

After listening to testimony describing the horrific injuries of the bombing victims, Breivik showed no remorse, saying if anyone should apologize it was the governing Labor Party.

He said he had hoped they would change policy on immigration after his attacks.

"But instead they continue in the same direction, so the grounds for struggle are unfortunately even more relevant now than before July 22," Breivik said.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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An expert sociologist says the testimony of far-right mass killer Anders Breivik should not be curtailed because his “repellent” views and rambling speech will actually put people off extremism.

Professor Thomas Hylland Eriksen, who has been called as an expert witness in Breivik’s trial, said self-confessed killer’s beliefs about immigration were “widely shared” in an interview with British broadcaster ITN. 

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In a scene unimaginable in many countries, Breivik this week got the chance to explain his fanatical views to the court and the world, unrepentant and dressed in a business suit. Prosecutors and lawyers for the families of his 77 victims even shook his hand.

The 33-year-old far-right militant gave a rambling hour-long address to the court on Tuesday, reading from a statement that essentially summarized the 1,500-page anti-Islamic manifesto he posted online before his bomb-and-shooting rampage nine months ago.

"The attacks on July 22 were a preventive strike. I acted in self-defense on behalf of my people, my city, my country," Breivik declared, demanding to be found innocent of terror and murder charges. "I would have done it again."

Breivik: I was motivated by goodness and 'would have done it again'

Breivik has five days to explain why he detonated a bomb outside government headquarters in Oslo, killing eight people, then drove to a nearby resort island, where he massacred 69 others, mostly teens, at a summer youth camp run by the governing Labor Party.

Breivik, who has admitted carrying out the grisly acts, boasted they were the most "spectacular" by a nationalist militant since World War II.

Breivik’s speech, which angered victims’ family members who were present, was not broadcast on television because of a court order preventing live feeds during the killer's testimony.

However, Professor Eriksen told ITN Breivik's speech was more likely to harm his cause.

Eriksen said:

"Parts of his world view are clearly widely shared, not by a majority but by substantial groups who feel globalization is not going their way, that their country is being invaded by a foreign alien enemy Muslims and feel that they are being ruled by spineless multiculturalists who don't see the dangers of Islam.

"I've been of two minds myself but I've reached a conclusion that it's a good thing to give him this platform because he doesn't appear credible, he's not very charismatic - he does't have ... the appeal that would attract people so I think he works more like a repellent, a mosquito repellent against right-wing extremism because people who see him realize how bad it would get if they are attracted to these crazy notions of purity of race."

On Monday, Norwegian prosecutors and even lawyers representing the families of victims shook Breivik's hand as the trial opened, raising some eyebrows. Prosecutors shaking hands with defendants would be a rare sight in the U.S., as well as in neighboring Sweden and other Nordic nations.

"That was a bit strange," said John Christian Elden, who represents some survivors but is not participating in the trial.

Breivik had asked to wear a uniform in court in pretrial hearings but was rebuffed, and he appeared at the trial in a business suit and tie, his thinning hair neatly combed.

"We don't have orange jumpsuits and that kind of thing in Norway," his lawyer Geir Lippestad said. "This is a completely normal way to dress in a Norwegian court, even in a serious criminal matter."

'Childishly defiant'
On Wednesday Breivik  told the court he had been inspired by Serbian nationalism.

Anders Breivik to Norway court: I killed 77 people but am not guilty

Asked how he had changed from a teenage vandal on Oslo's prosperous west side to a methodical killer, he said he helped found a militant group called the "Knights Templar" in 2001 but refused to give any details to back up the claim. 

The original Knights Templar were a medieval brotherhood of European knights that pursued anti-Islamic crusades. 

Breivik deflected five straight questions about supposed allies and repeatedly tried to tell prosecutors how to phrase themselves. He became visibly irritated and swiveled a pen in his hand. 

Breivik's trial, to last 10 weeks, turns on the question of his sanity and thus whether he can be jailed. He has said that an insanity ruling would be "worse than death." 

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He came off as "childishly defiant," Tore Sinding Bekkedal, a survivor of the island massacre, said during a break on Wednesday. "He's trying to steer the proceedings and failing." 

If found mentally sane — the key issue to be decided in the trial — Breivik could face a maximum 21-year prison sentence or an alternate custody arrangement that would keep him locked up as long as he is considered a menace to society.

If declared insane he would be committed to psychiatric care for as long as he's considered ill.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Self-confessed mass killer Anders Behring Breivik told his trial in Norway Tuesday that he was motivated by "goodness, not evil" and said, "I would have done it again."

On the second day of his trial, he boasted about last July's massacre in a pre-pepared statement to court, saying:  "I have carried out the most sophisticated and spectacular political attack committed in Europe since the Second World War."

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Breivik, 33, has said he acted to protect his country by setting off a car bomb that killed eight people at government headquarters in Oslo last July, then killing another 69 people in a shooting spree at a youth summer camp organized by the ruling Labor Party.

He has pleaded not guilty, saying he acted in defense of Norway against multiculturalism.

The trial will turn on whether Breivik is found guilty or insane.

While he risks being kept behind bars for the rest of his life, the high school dropout has said being labeled insane would be a "fate worse than death."

Breivik spoke for longer than the 30 minutes allotted for his 13-page statement, and was asked to finish by the judge. The statement is the start of an expected five days of testimony from Breivik before other witnesses are called.

Breivik insisted he should continue, telling the judge, "I never asked for 5 days, I just want 1 hour to explain myself," Sky News journalist Trygve Sorvaag reported on Twitter.

Breivik said the aim of the massacre was to end "multicultural drift", and set out his views on Muslims and sharia law. A court order prohibited broadcasters from showing pictures from inside the court while Breivik was speaking.

"People will understand me one day and see that multiculturism has failed," he said. "If I am right, how can what I did be illegal?"

"They (Norwegians) risk being a minority in their own capital in their own country in the future," he added.

Reporters inside the court described Breivik as "rambling", and said the court - in particular, relatives of the victims - grew impatient with the speech.

BBC reporter Matthew Price posted a picture of Breivik in the courtroom on Twitter after his speech had finished.

Earlier Tuesday, one of the lay judges hearing the case was dismissed after it emerged he had posted a comment on a Facebook page saying Breivik should face the death penalty.

Anders Breivik to Norway court: I killed 77 people but am not guilty

Shortly after the killings, Thomas Indrebø posted "the death penalty is the only just outcome of this case."

Breivik's defense lawyer said Indrebø should be dismissed from the case because of the remark, and it was later announced he would be replaced by a reserve lay judge.

The trial began on Monday, with two professional judges, as well as three lay judges chosen from civil society, presiding over the court.

The lay judge's dismissal is not expected to lead to any mistrial verdict.

Norway's VG newspaper reported the text of Indrebø's posting, according to a translation posted on The Telegraph news website.

"The death penalty is the only just sentence in this case!!!!!!!!!!" read the message. The Telegraph said the comment was posted below an article in VG only a day after Breivik killed 77 people with a bomb and gunfire.

A previous version of the story quoted Breivik as saying he "would do it all again," rather than "I would have done it again," based on a translation by Sky News.

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Updated at 12:25 p.m. ET: Militant Anders Behring Breivik admitted he killed 77 people in a massacre last July, but said he was pleading not guilty on the first day of a trial that threatens to turn into a "circus" showcasing his anti-Islamic views.

As he arrived in court - the early part of the session was broadcast on television - Breivik gave a salute, raising his arm with his fist clenched.

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The 33-year-old said: "I do not recognize the Norwegian courts. You have received your mandate from political parties which support multiculturalism. I do not acknowledge the authority of the court."

The trial will turn on whether Breivik is found guilty or insane.  If sane, he faces up to 21 years in prison; if deemed criminally insane, he would be committed to psychiatric care.

Shed tears
Listening impassively for hours as prosecutors read out an indictment detailing how he massacred teenagers trapped on a island resort outside Oslo, he only shed tears when the court later showed one of his propaganda videos.

"I acknowledge the acts but not criminal guilt as I claim self defence," he added, seated in front of a bullet-proof glass wall.

Occasionally suppressing a yawn, cracking his knuckles and sipping water, he stared down at the indictment papers, following without visible emotion the list of his killings as the prosecutor read out each one. Some details were so graphic that Norwegian television bleeped out descriptions of the massacres.

Breivik shot most of his victims several times, often using the first shot to take down his target then following up with a shot to the head. His youngest victim was 14. He later surrendered as "commander of the Norwegian resistance movement".

Prosecutors played a recording of an emergency call made by one of the summer campers hiding in the bathroom of a cafe.

"There's shooting all the time, I've seen many injured. He's inside!" Renate Taarnes screamed, as 13 people in the cafe were shot dead. "He's coming ... he's coming," she said as shots could be heard in the background.

But Breivik only became tearful while watching a movie of still pictures accompanied by text of his vision of evils of "multiculturalism" and "Islamic demographic warfare".

"I think he feels sorry for himself," said Mette Yvonne Larsen, one of the lawyers representing victims. "His project didn't work out, that's why he's crying. He's not crying for the victims ... he's crying over his extremely childish film."

The trial is scheduled to last 10 weeks and has raised fears that it could reopen wounds in Norway, a country that sees itself as a tolerant and peaceful society.

PhotoBlog: Anders Breivik in court

The "lone wolf" killer intends to say he was defending Norway against multiculturalism and Islam. He says his attacks were intended to punish "traitors" whose pro-immigration policies were adulterating Norwegian blood.

More than 200 people sat in the specially built courtroom while about 700 attack survivors and family members of victims watched on closed-circuit video around the country.

"It will be a tough time for many," survivor Vegard Groeslie Wennesland, 28, said outside the courtroom. "Last time I saw him in person he was shooting my friends."

Report: Threat from anti-jihadist extremists grows

Last July 22, Breivek set off a bomb in the centre of Oslo before heading to the youth camp on Utoeya, an island in a lake 25 miles outside the capital, gunning down his victims while police took more than an hour to get to the massacre site in the chaos that followed the bomb blast.

Disguised as a police officer, Breivik managed to lure some of his victims out of hiding, saying help had arrived. Other victims jumped into the lake, where he shot them in the water.

Prosecutor Inga Bejer Engh spoke of the "panic and mortal fear in children, youths and adults" trapped on the island.

While video footage of the Oslo bomb blast was played to the court, victims and their families cried as but Breivik smiled on several occasions.

Prosecutors painted an image of a Breivik obsessed with the "World of Warcraft" computer game, prompting the judge to ask whether the game was violent. Breivik broke into a smile when the image of his online character was displayed.

An initial psychiatric evaluation concluded that Breivik was criminally insane while a second, completed in the past week, found no evidence of psychosis. Resolving this conflict could be the five-judge panel's major decision.

If found guilty and sane, Breivik faces a maximum 21-year sentence but could be held indefinitely if he is considered a continuing danger. If declared insane, he would be held in a psychiatric institution indefinitely with periodic reviews.

Meanwhile he has made clear he intends to make use of the trial to air his views when he testifies next week.

 "Your arrest will mark the initiation of the propaganda phase," he wrote in a manual for future attackers, part of a 1,500-page manifesto he posted online, according to Reuters. "Your trial offers you a stage to the world."

In a recent letter seen by Norwegian newspaper VG, Breivik added: "The court case looks like it will be a circus ... it is an absolutely unique opportunity to explain the idea of (the manifesto) to the world."

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Norwegian Anders Behring Breivik was sane when he killed 77 people last summer in attacks he saw as punishing "traitors" who favored immigration, a psychiatric team said on Tuesday, in a report contradicting an earlier one that found him psychotic.

Breivik himself has insisted he is mentally stable and demanded that the attacks - the most violent in Norway since World War Two - be judged as a political act rather than the work of a deranged mind.

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"The mental health experts' main conclusion is that defendant Anders Behring Breivik is considered not to have been psychotic at the time of the actions on July 22, 2011," Oslo District Court said in a statement.

A report completed in November found Breivik to be a psychotic who also suffered from paranoid schizophrenia during and after the July 22 attacks.

A final ruling on Breivik's mental condition will be made by a five-judge panel near the end of his trial. The latest report could give the judges grounds to sentence Breivik to prison if found guilty.

His trial on terror and murder charges is due to start next week and is expected to last 10 weeks.

Breivik, 33, has admitted detonating a bomb that killed eight people at government headquarters in Oslo, then massacring 69 people with gunfire at a Labor Party summer camp. Most of the summer camp victims were teenagers.

In a preliminary court hearing Breivik denied criminal guilt and suggested his actions were part of a war to save European culture.

If Breivik is found guilty and the judges side with the latest psychiatric report, he could face 21 years in prison with the potential for indefinite extensions to prevent him from repeating his crimes.

If he is eventually ruled psychotic, Breivik would likely face an indefinite period of psychiatric care in a locked facility.

Breivik's defense team has said its primary goal at the trial would be to prove their client sane.

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Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

A Norwegian court on Friday ordered a new psychiatric evaluation of confessed mass killer Anders Behring Breivik, after an earlier report found him legally insane.

Judge Wenche Elizabeth Arntzen said in Oslo the new evaluation is necessary considering widespread criticism of the initial findings, which suggested Breivik should be sent to psychiatric care instead of prison.

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The 32-year-old Norwegian has confessed to a bomb and shooting spree July 22 that killed 77 people and traumatized the peaceful Scandinavian country.

Breivik denies criminal guilt, saying he's a commander of a resistance movement aiming to overthrow European governments and replace them with "patriotic" regimes that would deport Muslim immigrants.

Investigators have found no sign of such a movement and say Breivik most likely plotted and carried out the attacks on his own.

Arntzen said two Norwegian psychiatrists — Agnar Aspaas and Terje Toerrisen — had been appointed for the new evaluation.

However, Breivik doesn't want to talk to them because he doesn't believe they will understand him any better than the experts who interviewed him for the first assessment, defense lawyer Geir Lippestad, told reporters after speaking to his client in prison.

Lippestad also said that the defense team is skeptical toward a new evaluation because the first assessment was leaked to Norwegian media.

"We want evidence to be presented in court and not in the media," Lippestad told Norwegian broadcaster NRK.

Before the court's decision, Breivik rejected the need for a new evaluation in a motion filed by Lippestad.

The first court-ordered assessment found Breivik was psychotic during the attacks, which would make him mentally unfit to be convicted and imprisoned for the country's worst peacetime massacre.

Prosecutors said that report, submitted in November, describes Breivik as a paranoid schizophrenic living in a "delusional universe."

That conclusion drew criticism from many outside experts who questioned whether someone who is suffering from a grave mental illness could carry out such a well-planned attack.

Arntzen also noted that staff at Ila prison in Oslo, where Breivik is being held in pretrial detention, say they haven't observed any signs suggesting he is psychotic.

"These circumstances point toward letting independent experts conduct a new evaluation of the suspect's accountability," Arntzen said.

Asked what would happen if the new assessment conflicts with the first one, Arntzen said both reports would be considered by the court when the trial starts in April.

Breivik has told investigators he set off the fertilizer bomb that ripped through Oslo's government district on July 22, killing eight people. He then opened fire at the summer camp of the governing Labor Party's youth wing on the island of Utoya, where sixty-nine people were killed before Breivik surrendered to a SWAT team.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.