Security services in Norway could have prevented all or part of an the attack by Anders Breivik according to a new report.

A government commission examined the massacre in which 77 people were killed last year.

It said intelligence services could have learned about his plans months before the attack.

It also believes the government building he bombed should have been better protected and he should have been stopped before he gunned down dozens of victims on a near-by island.

Breivik first detonated a fertilizer car bomb outside government headquarters in Oslo killing 8 people last July.

He then travelled to the summer camp of the ruling Labour Party on Utoeya Island where he gunned down 69 victims unimpeded.

Authorities had become aware of his suspicious activities months before when he purchased items that could be used to make bombs.

But the commission said intelligence service failures meant he was not put on a watch list.

The government building should have been much better protected as it had been identified as a security risk years before.

However government squabbling over minor details of the security measures needed meant little was done.

It says the incident revealed ‘serious shortfalls in society’s emergency preparedness and ability to avert threats’.

The Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said he took ultimate responsibility for the failures after the report was published.