21 June 2012 Last updated at 07:44 ET

Breivik trial awaits prosecutors' stance on sanity

The trial of Anders Behring Breivik in Oslo is waiting to hear whether prosecutors will ask for him to be sent to prison or into psychiatric care.

They have begun summing up their case, with their decision resting on whether they believe he was sane when he killed 77 people in Norway last year.

Conflicting psychiatric evaluations were presented earlier.

Breivik bombed government buildings in Oslo before shooting young Labour Party supporters at an island camp.

As well as killing 77 people, he injured 242.

Breivik sought to justify his attacks by saying they were necessary to stop the "Islamisation" of Norway.

The defence concludes on Friday, and a verdict is expected in July or August.

'Killing machine'

One of the prosecutors, Svein Holden, said that under Norwegian law, reasonable doubt should benefit the defendant in cases of criminal guilt.

However, he asked whether that should also apply to the question of the defendant's accountability.

Earlier on Thursday, Mr Holden's colleague Inga Bejer Engh told the court it had always been the prosecution's clear view that the case should be treated like any other criminal case.

"We must also accept this court will never find all the answers to our questions," she added.

"How did he become this killing machine? How many did he try to kill on that day?"

Without a hint of regret, she said, Breivik had told the court how he had reloaded his gun while victims sat waiting for him to kill them on the island of Utoeya.

Breivik could be seen smiling at times as he listened to the prosecutor.

Before the trial, a court-ordered pair of psychiatrists found Breivik insane, suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, and therefore not responsible for his actions.

This caused an uproar in Norway. The court then ordered a second opinion which found Breivik sane, as did a number of other psychiatrists who had observed him in detention and in court.

When they presented their formal indictment in March, the prosecutors called for Breivik to be committed to psychiatric care, based on the first report.

But they said they might change their recommendation if new information were to surface about his mental health.

If judged to be sane, Breivik faces Norway's maximum prison sentence of 21 years, a sentence that can be extended as long as he is considered a threat to society.

If he is found criminally insane, he could spend the rest of his life in psychiatric care.

Breivik wants to be found sane, believing his extreme-right anti-Islam ideology would then have to be taken seriously, rather than being portrayed as the works of a madman, says the BBC's correspondent Lars Bevanger in court in Oslo.