Barcelona attack: Terror van driver Younes Abouyaaqoub still on the run, police say

The 22-year-old is being sought by police following the Las Ramblas massacre

Police take security measures as people gather and mourn at La Rambla (Getty Images)

Spanish police now believe the driver of the van that was used to kill 13 and injure more than 130 people in Barcelona on Thursday could still be on the run, local media reports.

A 22-year-old Moroccan national named Younes Abouyaaqoub is at the focus of a new manhunt following the massacre on Las Ramblas, where a van caused carnage by being driven through a crowded pedestrian area.

The street is now the site of extensive floral tributes and messages of solidarity from visitors from around the world, with tourists returning to the tree-lined boulevard and local business owners making a concerted effort to go back to work after the dark events of this week.

As the circumstances surrounding the planning of the attack started to become clear, five men were shot by police after a later attack in Cambrils, an hour and a half drive west of Barcelona, on Friday. Those killed included 17-year-old Moussa Oukabir, who Spanish media previously identified as the driver the van.

Now Spanish newspaper El Pais says Catalonia’s police are searching for Mr Abouyaaqoub, believed to be a key member of a terror cell who they say planned the attack.

The police believe that explosions reported in the nearby down of Alcanar, two hours drive west of Barcelona, on Wednesday, may have been accidental blast at a bomb-making factory - depriving the alleged terror cell of material.

After the loss of their explosive material the terrorists defaulted to using more low tech methods - the van - to carry out the attack, police now believe.

Tributes laid on La Rambla attracted crowds (Jon Stone for The Independent)

As Barcelonans enter the weekend to take stock of events in their city, El Pais now says there is a growing belief that Mr Abouyaaqoub is the main suspect, after police chief Josep Trapero told local TV late on Friday that the younger Mr Oukabir was the suspect “had less weight”.

Investigators have floated the idea that the cell was building a large scale truck bomb built from gas canisters, and could have planned to carry out multiple attacks at the same time. The explosion on Wednesday ahead of the attack was reported in local media as a gas explosion at the time.

Around 20 bottles of butane were discovered in the ruins of a house in Alcanar, which analysts said could have been loaded into a vehicle and blown up in a ramming attack.

The teenager Mr Oukabir is suspected of using his brother's documents to hire the white van that ploughed through pedestrians in the tourist hotspot on Thursday evening.

He reportedly died along with Said Aallaa, 19, and Mohamed Hychami, 24, who were part of a group that mounted a similar attack in Cambrils that left one woman dead and six people injured.

Four men, aged 21, 27, 28 and 34, who were arrested in connection with the attack remain in custody.

Three are Moroccan and one Spanish. Police says none of those arrested was previously known to the security services for terror-related reasons.

The young Mr Oukabir's older brother, Driss Oukabir, is reported by local media to be one of those detained.

A second van found in the town of Vic in Catalonia, an hour's drive north of Barcelona, is also being investigated by police amid reports that the attackers had tried to hire a lorry, which was foiled when the driver failed to produce the necessary permit.