Gunman criticised Cowen, McCreevy for EU referendums

BREIVIK ONLINE MANIFESTO:ANDERS BEHRING Breivik criticised Brian Cowen and Charlie McCreevy for their handling of the Lisbon treaty referendum in his online manifesto.

Breivik devoted five pages of the document to the two Irish Lisbon Treaty referendums, which he saw as conclusive proof that the European Union was “organised treason”.

Breivik published his manifesto in English under the name Andrew Berwick earlier this year. He claimed that it took him nine years and cost him more than €300,000 in research fees and lost earnings to write.

Breivik described the first Lisbon Treaty referendum in 2008 as a “powerful testimony to the evil nature of the European Union”.

He notes that neither the then taoiseach Brian Cowen nor then EU commissioner Charlie McCreevy had read the Lisbon Treaty, yet both had advocated a yes vote.

This, he said, was proof that the “will of the people is merely an annoying speed bump which slows down the implementation of their supremely enlightened policies”.

He also referred to Mr McCreevy’s contention that no more than two dozen Irish people had read the treaty and understood its contents – “yet he saw nothing inherently wrong with this”.

Breivik also quoted veteran anti-EU campaigner Anthony Coughlan to back up his argument. In an essay in the news website EU Observer, Mr Coughlan argued that EU integration would lead to a "gradual coup by government executives against legislatures, and by politicians against the citizens who elect them". This Breivik saw as demonstrating that the EU could not function as "anything other than an increasingly totalitarian pan-European dictatorship, run by a self-appointed oligarchy".

Mr Coughlan said last night: “It is news to me that this lunatic has picked up this information. Those themes are quite common about critics of the EU project.

“Anything one says can be taken by lunatics anywhere in the world and perverted. I have had connections in Norway and I have attended conferences there, but I’ve never met this guy.”

Breivik believed Marxism was taking over western Europe and paving the way for Islam to replace Christianity across the continent.