Spain terror attacks: 13 killed and 100 injured – as it happened

Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy cancelled his holiday in Galicia, north-west Spain, to return to Madrid.

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Senior police official Josep Lluis Trapero said the attack van drove on to the pavement, swerving among pedestrians in a crowded area, and was “clearly a terror attack intended to kill as many people as possible”.

He said the van driver made off on foot and was not believed to be armed.

Local media said police were hunting a suspect named Driss Oukabir, after the passport of a Spanish citizen, of Moroccan origin, was found at the scene.

Later it was reported that Oukabir has denied being involved in the attack and told police his documents had been stolen.

Two suspects are in custody but neither are the van driver, Catalan authorities said.

The Australian foreign minister, Julie Bishop, has just given a press conference.

One Australian women, from New South Wales, is in hospital in a “serious but stable condition”.

Two other young men from Melbourne had been “directly affected” but had returned to their hotel rooms. She said there were “multiple nationalities” among those killed and injured.

She urged tourists to stay in their hotel rooms, as the situation was still evolving, and contact consular staff to let them know they were safe.

17 Aug 201717.51 EDT

Three German citizens are reportedly among the dead

Philip Oltermann

At least three German citizens were among those who died during the Barcelona attack, according to a report by broadcaster ZDF which cited security sources.

17 Aug 201717.48 EDT

Mike Ticher

The Australian government is concerned that Australians may have been caught up in the terror attack in Barcelona.

Cabinet minister Christopher Pyne says they are “concerned” Australians may be involved. Some reports are saying two may be injured, but there is nothing official yet.

The federal government has marshalled its officials in Spain to seek out Australians in the city of Barcelona after a terror attack.

“We are concerned that Australians may be involved and the embassy there in Madrid and the consulates that are available are searching for the Australians in Barcelona,” cabinet minister Christopher Pyne told Nine Network on Friday.

“The government wants any Australians in the city to let people know they are safe - either through Facebook, by calling relatives or contacting the consulate in Spain.”

An Australian tourist has told of the horror that unfolded moments after the van ploughed into crowds. Susan McLean, who was about 100m from the scene and was separated from her husband in the panic, told Nine Network:

All of a sudden there was this tidal wave of people running from both Placa de Catalunya and Las Ramblas towards us screaming, crying and with absolute terror etched on their faces.

Initially we couldn’t hear anything other than all these people running towards us. Several of them were calling ‘gun, gun’, so first of all we thought someone had been shot.

Then they just kept sort of - it was all in Spanish. It was very difficult to understand but they were sort of pushing us into shops.

That was quite scary because I wasn’t sure where he was but the shopkeepers were great. They pulled everyone inside and put the shutters down.

My first reaction was the Bourke Street massacre, because that is what it reminded me of, the vision of people fleeing in just such terror.

Another tourist, Julia Monaco from Melbourne told Nine police on the scene suddenly ordered her and her family inside a shop just across from where the attack happened.

In a split second it all kind of changed and everyone just started running and panicking and running for their lives and crying and screaming and we were forced back into the store, told to get away from the windows and to get low on the ground.

We were huddled at the very back of the store lying flat on if floor and were in that position for about 20 minutes with no real understanding of what was happening other than it was incredibly serious.

Prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has tweeted his condolences. He said: “Our love & prayers are with the victims.”

17 Aug 201717.35 EDT

Julian Borger

My colleague, Julian Borger, has more on the house explosion:

Police officials have suggested there could be a connection between the Barcelona attack and two explosions earlier in the day in a house in Alcanar, a small town in Tarragona about 100km south of Barcelona, in which one person died and 16 people were injured, including police and firefighters who were investigating the first explosion and were hit by a second blast. The explosions had initially been reported as gas explosions.

Read the full story on the terror attack here:

This is a photograph of the house in Alcanar, Catalonia, which was destroyed by an explosion. Police are now investigating a link between the incident and today’s terror attack.

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Neither of the two detained suspects was the driver of the van that crashed into pedestrians in Barcelona, police have said.

Josep Lluis Trapero, a senior police officer, said the two suspects in custody were directly linked to the attack, “but that doesn’t mean that either were the author of the attack”.

The whereabouts of the driver of the van was unclear.

The two suspects in custody are a Spanish national from Melilla and a Moroccan.

Catalonian police are now connecting the Las Ramblas van attack with an explosion this morning in Alcanar, a small town in Tarragona about 100km south of Barcelona, in which one person died and several injured, which was reported earlier as a gas explosion

The explosion happened in a house, a Catalan police official said.

My colleagues, Stephen Burgen in Barcelona, Giles Tremlett in Madrid and Ian Cobain in London, have spoken to a number of witnesses.

Tom Markwell, from New Orleans, had just arrived in a taxi when he heard the screaming. “It sounded like they were screaming for a movie star,” he said. “Then I saw the van. It had already been busted on the front. It was weaving left and right, trying to hit people as fast as possible. There were people lying on the ground.”

Liam Searle said: “I was very, very close to it. It was like 10ft from me. I luckily wasn’t on the Ramblas, I was in the road, and I quickly ran into, I think it was the opera house, along with everyone else.

“Everyone was hiding behind things. And no one had a clue what was going on. We just heard a load of bangs and some other things and then, like, everyone just ran.”

Read more here: