Barcelona van attack kills 13 in agonizing repeat for Europe

BARCELONA, Spain — A van veered onto a promenade and barreled down the busy walkway in central Barcelona on Thursday, swerving back and forth as it mowed down pedestrians and turned a picturesque tourist destination into a bloody killing zone. Thirteen people were killed and 100 were injured, 15 of them seriously, in what authorities called a terror attack.

The late afternoon attack in the city’s Las Ramblas district left victims sprawled in the historic street, spattered with blood or writhing in pain from broken limbs. Others were ushered inside shops by officers with their guns drawn or fled in panic, screaming and carrying young children in their arms.

“It was clearly a terror attack, intended to kill as many people as possible,” Josep Lluis Trapero, a senior police official for Spain’s Catalonia region told reporters late Thursday.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility, saying in a statement on its Aamaq news agency that the attack was carried out by “soldiers of the Islamic State” in response to the extremist group’s calls for followers to target countries participating in the coalition trying to drive it from Syria and Iraq.

Early today, Catalan police said they shot and killed five suspects in a seaside resort town south of Barcelona in response to a terrorist attack. They also said six civilians were injured in Cambrils but didn’t immediately say how. The force is working on the theory that the Cambrils suspects are linked to the Barcelona attack, as well as to a Wednesday night explosion in the town of Alcanar in which one person was killed.

The Catalan regional government said citizens from 24 countries were among the people killed and injured during the Barcelona van attack.