232696
233034

World  

Barcelona fugitive killed

A man thought to be the driver in the Barcelona van attack was shot dead by Spanish police Monday after authorities announced he also was suspected of killing the owner of a hijacked getaway car. The fugitive was wearing a bomb belt, authorities said.

Younes Abouyaaqoub was shot when officers confronted him in Subirats, a rural area known for its vineyards about 45 kilometres west of Barcelona, police in Spain's Catalonia region said. A bomb disposal robot was dispatched to approach him, police said.

Abouyaaqoub, 22, had been the target of an international manhunt that had raised fears throughout the region since Thursday's van attack in Barcelona.

Authorities said Monday they now have evidence that Abouyaaqoub drove the van that plowed down the city's famed Las Ramblas promenade, killing 13 pedestrians and injuring more than 120 others.

They said Abouyaaqoub, who was born in Morocco and has Spanish residency, also is suspected of carjacking a man and stabbing him to death as he made his getaway, raising the death toll between the Barcelona attack and a related attack hours later to 15.

Another vehicle attack early Friday by other members of what Catalonia regional police have described as a 12-member extremist cell killed one person and wounded several others in the coastal town of Cambrils. That ended in a shootout with police, who killed five attackers.

The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for both attacks.

Roser Ventura, whose father owns a vineyard between the towns of Sadurni d'Anoia and Subirats, said he alerted the regional Catalan police when they spotted a car crossing their property at high speed.



More World News