OSLO (AFP).- Norway on Thursday offered to abandon a controversial memorial project for the victims of Anders Behring Breivik's 2011 massacre, after local residents sued the state.

The planned sculpture would see a wide slit entitled "Memory Wound" cut into a strip of land facing the island of Utoya where most of Breivik's 77 victims were killed.  

"We wish to avoid a painful lawsuit, which would be very burdensome on a lot of people," Norway's minister of local government, Jan Tore Sanner, said on Thursday.

"We are willing to find a different memorial than the one initially planned," he told Norwegian radio NRK.

But the announcement failed to satisfy locals, who sued the state in June to block the construction, arguing it was illegal to construct something that would cause harm to the local community and landscape.

"This isn't a victory. The location remains the same. Sanner only plans to change the artistic plans. That's out of the question," one of the leading opponents, Ole Morten Jensen, wrote on Facebook.

The small Utoya island, located in the Tyrifjorden lake, was the scene of Breivik's gun rampage on July 22, 2011. He spent more than an hour shooting at hundreds of people gathered for a summer camp organised by the Labour Party's youth wing, killing 69 of them. 

Just before that, the right-wing extremist had set off a bomb in a van parked at the foot of the government offices in Oslo, killing eight other people.

Breivik is serving a 21-year prison sentence which can be extended indefinitely if he is still considered a danger to society. 

Locals have insisted that the memorial would be a constant reminder of the tragedy to those who live nearby, and lead to an unwelcome increase in visits to the area.



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