Breivik leaves court at witness' request

A survivor of the 2011 massacre of 77 people in Norway asked the confessed killer to leave the courtroom Monday before she testified at his trial in Oslo. Frida Holm Skoglund, 20, became the first witness during the trial to ask Anders Breivik to leave before she took the stand, Britain's Guardian reported. Breivik agreed and watched a video feed of the hearing next door. The 33-year-old Breivik confessed to the July 22 killings in a bomb attack at a government building in downtown Oslo and a shooting spree on nearby Utoya Island but pleaded not guilty to murder and terrorism charges. He claimed "self-defense" and said his actions were justified because he was waging war against multi-culturalism and what he termed a Muslim invasion of Europe. Skoglund, one of several survivors who testified Monday, said she was in the camp when she heard a series of bangs, then saw a man "dressed in police uniform" and suddenly fellow campers "scattered like birds." The man was Brevik, who has described the island shootings, in which 69 people died, as "brutal but necessary." Skoglund said she ran for a while before realizing she had been shot. "I touched my thigh and felt something sharp there," she said. "I pulled it out and I saw -- I felt the bullet." Lars Gronnestad, 20, testified about lying on the ground after a bullet punctured his lung. "I remember thinking I can't just lie here, I need to get away, this is too open," he said. "While I was looking for somewhere to go I was thinking who this could be? A right-wing extremist, left-wing extremist ... what it could be?"