Swiss intelligence services are monitoring up to ten people who have expressed sympathy with the manifesto written by the author the deadly attacks in Norway ten days ago.

In an interview with NZZ am Sonntag newspaper, deputy chief of the Switzerland’s counter intelligence agency, Jürg Bühler, said the people in question had responded “positively” to the attacks in online posts.

Bühler said that although security services had not found anyone who “expressly applauded the attacks”, certain people had praised the ideology expressed in the 1,500-page manifesto written by Norway shooter Anders Behring Breivik.

Bühler said federal intelligence services would seek the assistance of cantonal authorities over the coming days to determine if the people in question had already been identified by other authorities.

“Next, we will try to determine to what degree they could be violent and verify whether they are part of a larger scene,” Bühler told the newspaper.

In a double bombing attack and shooting spree carried out on July 22, Breivik killed more than 70 people in what he has since said was necessary attack aimed at halting Muslim immigration in Norway.

In compliance with the JTI standards

More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative