Three days of public mourning as third Barcelona attack suspect arrested
Third suspect in Barcelona attack arrested. Catalonia regional government declares three days of national mourning. Second terror attack foiled. Police link second attack to Barcelona attack. Barcelona attack kills 13.
Following the terrorist attack in Barcelona, Spain on Thursday (August 17) that left 13 dead and more than 100 injured, the country's security agencies are continuing their search to arrest the perpetrator of the attack.
A third suspect in the Barcelona attack was arrested on Friday (August 18). Spanish police said the man was arrested in the town of Ripoll in the Catalan province of Catalonia, about 100 kilometers north of Barcelona, according to AFP. The previous day, a Moroccan man was arrested in the same area, allegedly linked to the vehicle used in the attack.
Another suspect was arrested by security forces in the southern Catalan city of Alcanar. The suspect was identified as a Spanish man from the Spanish enclave of Melilla. The two suspects arrested on Thursday were not the driver of the van. The identity of the suspect arrested on Friday is also not yet known.
The head of the Catalan regional government, Carlos Puigdemont, warned on Friday that there was still a “terrorist” at large. The fugitive may have been the “dangerous” driver of the van, whom the government official described as the “terrorist”.
Reports had previously indicated that the man who drove a van into a crowd of people on Barcelona's tourist strip, Las Ramblas, on Thursday had not yet been arrested. The driver of the van had fled the scene after the attack. The famous Las Ramblas is one of the busiest and most visited tourist areas in the city.
According to eyewitnesses, a white van drove at high speed into a crowd of people on this busy street full of tourists in Barcelona, killing and injuring many people.
Just hours after the deadly incident in Barcelona, a similar attack occurred in the small town of Cambrils, located about 100 kilometers south of the capital of Catalonia.
In a related development, Spanish authorities said that police officers killed five terror suspects armed with suicide belts in the town of Cambrils in the early hours of Friday morning, in what they said was the second terror attack in the country.
According to Spanish police, the attackers in Cambrils, like in the Barcelona incident, ran over a number of people with a van. Accordingly, one police officer and six bystanders were injured.
Spanish police have called the Barcelona incident a "terrorist act," and the Islamic State (formerly ISIS) terrorist group has claimed responsibility.
There have also been reports of German tourists among the victims of the Barcelona attack. German television channel ZDF, citing security sources, reported that three Germans were among the victims of the Spanish terror attack. However, this has not yet been officially confirmed.
The Catalan regional government has simultaneously declared three days of official public mourning in memory of the victims of the deadly Barcelona attack.
