Return to Transcripts main page

Wolf

Terror Attack in Barcelona; One Death in Barcelona Attack; Police Call Attack Terrorism; Tillerson on Barcelona Attack. Aired 1- 1:30p ET

Aired August 17, 2017 - 13:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. Wherever you're watching from around the world, thanks very much for joining us.

We begin with the breaking news out of Barcelona, Spain where a van has crashed into a large crowd of people in what people are -- what the police are calling a terror attack. We expect a news conference from the local police to begin any moment now. We'll have live coverage of that.

Here is what we know right now. Government officials report at least one death, 17 injured. This video shows the immediate aftermath. The area where this happened is very popular with tourists from around the world. You can see several people on the ground. The driver still unaccounted for. A massive manhunt is now underway. You can see police clearing the nearby alley.

Witnesses say they have no doubt the crash was intentional. One person tells local media the van was traveling around 50 miles per hour, when it plowed into the crowd. Another witness says they heard the sound of gunshots while they were hiding in the nearby store.

CNN's Michael Holmes is following the developments for us. Our Justice Correspondent Evan Perez is with me here in Washington. Michael, help us better appreciate exactly what has unfolded over the past hour or so.

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Wolf, when these sorts of things happen, of course your first instinct is to hope it is not a terror attack. While Catalan police, as you point out just in the last few minutes, really, confirming that this is, indeed, being treated as a terror attack.

They had activated their terror protocols earlier, but now confirming this, indeed, looks like an intentional attack on this most famous street in Barcelona. A beautiful place.

A lot of people watching may well have been there. A pedestrian thoroughfare, popular with tourists and locals. It's lined with shops and restaurants and bars. And let's remember, you're at the height of the tourist season. It's been a sunny day in Barcelona. In the late afternoon, it would have been teeming with people. Some images that we've seen from the street and the immediate aftermath show a number of casualties on the ground.

The official word is one dead and more than a dozen injured. But, Wolf, all indications are that number is way low. It's going to go up. We're hoping to hear more from police in a short time in a news conference.

The Spanish prime minister has been tweeting saying that, cannot confirm the motive at the moment but obviously it is a terror attack.

You're talking about a street, Las Ramblas, which is about a kilometer or so, long -- about a mile long. And always at this time of day, on a sunny summer day, it would have people everywhere. And this van plowing in, 80 kilometers an hour, 50 miles an hour as you said.

It would have just been utter carnage and the scenes we've been seeing would reflect that. Immediate police response, anti-terror security is on the scene as well.

These reports still worrying that this is not over, in that two men are thought to be armed had gone into either a restaurant or a bar and barricaded themselves inside. Still trying to get clarity on that situation of what is happening with those two men.

There were reports in local media of hearing shots fired. We don't know how many people, if any, were in that restaurant or bar. And, at the moment, police are trying to get clarity on exactly what is going on and the status of that standoff -- Wolf.

BLITZER: You know, Michael, I want you to hold on for a moment. We have someone who was an eyewitness to the aftermath of this attack. John Bothell (ph) is joining us on the phone right now. John, thanks very much for joining us.

First of all, where were you and what did you see?

JOHN BOTHELL (via telephone): I was just on Catalonian Square which is at the top of the Ramblas. It's like the main center of Barcelona. I'm just working just next to here. And I was just on the street.

And what I saw is, like, unusual (INAUDIBLE) because everything is now with no people. The police is, like, closing all the area. It's everything full of police and nobody there. And the police is, like, restraining all the -- all the area, because no one can access there.

[13:05:02] Because they were saying just when I was going through my -- to the office, the police were saying that, go away. There's, like, an armed man run away. Because you cannot be here and all the people was, like, going inside the hotels, all the shop, shut everything down.

And so, what I saw is, like, people running through the whole -- all directions and the police saying, then, shut down or get away because there's an armed man here. So, you have to run away or get inside somewhere.

BLITZER: There's conflicting reports, John, whether or not there was one or two individuals involved in this car ramming in this assault, and that they may have actually entered a restaurant or a bar in the area.

What can you tell us about that? If you know anything than at all.

BOTHELL: Yes. I just -- some reports here on the radio station where I work at were telling us there was a person, just a van that was crashed just in front of the Laquita (ph), the market of Laquita, where the attack has occurred.

And there were another van that hasn't been located and the police were saying that through, like, the social media, the Catalonian police official Twitter that were saying that there was another van that was they are in search of.

So, that's why the Catalonian police was telling everything on (INAUDIBLE) street, on this Catalonian Square. And also, like, all through of Ramblas to get inside.

Because what I saw also was a couple of armed policemen, like, searching and going through these narrow streets which cross the Ramblas on the -- on the main (INAUDIBLE) center of Barcelona. Like, saying to people to get inside.

So, the sensation was that the attack was occurring at that moment.

BLITZER: So, the indications are that if there were one or two individuals involved, may have been one van. May have been two vans, but no one, as far as you know, John, has so far been arrested? The suspect or suspects are at large. They are -- they are -- the police are looking for them. Is that right?

BOTHELL: Yes, that's right. Because, in fact, the Catalonian police have now, like, opened the perimeter. It was just, like, the main center but now it has opened. Like, the -- for the full block.

Several blocks also, not from the main city center where they have, like, spread all the -- all these shutdown of the city center. And, like, the police doesn't get anywhere. Like, inside. They cannot get inside of a very big perimeter that, at first, it was much little.

So, now, what we're saying is that, like, the person that has -- or the persons, we cannot say that, that have been committed these attack are now not located.

BLITZER: They're still at large. They have not yet been located. We're standing by, John, by the way, for a police news conference. We expect local police to be making a statement, giving some information. In fact, this may be it. Let's listen in. I think we have translation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE.) BLITZER: Unfortunately, we don't have translation. We're going to

work on that. We're going to get the translation for our viewers here in the United States and around the world. But we're getting more information right now.

In the meantime, I want to bring in our Senior National Security Analyst Lisa Monaco. Lisa, what can you tell us? I assume you've been checking your sources about what may have happened in Barcelona.

LISA MONACO, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, thanks, Wolf. Obviously, this is, unfortunately, disturbingly reminiscent of the types of attacks we've seen elsewhere in Europe. It was just over a year ago that we saw a truck in Nice, France, brutally attack a crowd of revelers for Bastille Day.

So, what the authorities are going to be looking at first is, as your eyewitness just described, to understand the situation, to try and make sure that they have identified whether or not this is an ongoing situation.

They're going to be pushing that perimeter out, as your eyewitness described, to separate out the civilians and the pedestrians who are there on that Las Ramblas from those who may be injured and needing assistance. They're going to try to stabilize that situation and understand if it's an ongoing attack.

But this is the type of thing that has the hallmarks of ISIS-inspired violence. We do not know yet what the -- what the perpetrators were inspired by. If they were externally directed. If they were, in fact, ISIS operatives.

But it certainly does have the hallmarks of the type of terrorist vile answer that has been called for in the past by the ISIS spokesman, Mohammed Adnani, who famously called in 2014 for ISIS sympathizers to act wherever they are, including using a car or a truck to kill civilians.

[13:10:07] BLITZER: Yes, he's -- he made the point online. If you don't have a gun or a bomb, get a knife. If you don't have a knife, use a car. Go ahead and do whatever you can to kill the infidels.

But we don't know this is ISIS. Lisa, hold on one second. Evan Perez, our Justice Correspondent, is with us as well. He's been working his sources. What are you picking up now?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, in the brief minute there, we were able to hear the press conference. I heard the police official there say that there were 32 people injured. There was one person dead that they have confirmed.

Obviously, some of the pictures that we've seen from the Ramblas, it seems to indicate that there's a lot more people who are injured. Perhaps, even more dead, that we're going to learn later on, obviously, in this -- in this country -- on this country. And Lisa would know this, obviously, from her experience. At this moment, you have the FBI, the National Counterterrorism Center, the CIA. All the intelligence community, all the agencies are in contact with the Spanish authorities trying to see if they can lend any assistance.

Obviously, one of the big concerns for the American authorities is whether any U.S. persons might be affected, might be injured or killed in this -- in this attack.

The Spanish police now, the Cataluna police, are now saying that this was definitely a terror attack. They say they're searching, according to the -- a little bit of the press conference that we heard. They said that they were searching for the person who was driving the van. The van that carried out this attack. It was driving 50 miles an hour down this busy, busy corridor.

At this point, Wolf, we don't know that -- I wasn't able to hear whether or not anybody -- whether they have any information about the reports of people being held hostage or two gunmen who had gone into a bar or a restaurant there near the scene. That, obviously, is something that they're still trying to figure out, at this point. But the police didn't give any clarity in the moment that we were able to listen.

BLITZER: Yes. They said one dead -- one confirmed dead, 32 --

PEREZ: Thirty-two inured.

BLITZER: -- people injured. But they also went on to say they expect, unfortunately, that death toll to rise as they get more information.

Hold on for a moment. Our Terrorism Analyst Paul Cruickshank is joining us now as well. Paul, you've been checking all the various sources there. Has any group, any individual, anyone claim credit for this?

PAUL CRUICKSHANK, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: No claim of responsibility from any group, ISIS or otherwise, for what appears to be some kind of attack today in Barcelona, Wolf.

In terms of the modus operandi here. As Lisa was saying, this has the hallmarks of an ISIS-inspired type of attack. Certainly, what they've been encouraging their followers to do. They've been encouraging their followers in Europe to launch multiphase attacks, where first, they attack with vehicles and then carry on the attack either with blades or with guns.

We saw that modus operandi play out with the Westminster attack on the bridge in London in March of this year. We saw that modus operandi even more recently in London in June, when three attackers in the evening launched a vehicle attack and then went out and started stabbing people in the Borough Market.

All of those attacks are believed to have been inspired, at the very least, by ISIS. It's early stages at moment, in the terms of information coming in. But this may well be another multi-phase attack, where the same perpetrators who drove the vehicle into crowds carried on their attack. It could still be an ongoing situation. We're still trying to figure that out -- Wolf.

BLITZER: The ISIS-inspired attacks, whether using a vehicle or knives or bombs in Europe, usually in France or Belgium or the U.K., Spain, correct me if I'm wrong, not necessarily an immediate target, a major target. Has it been?

CRUICKSHANK: It's not been such a big target for ISIS. Spain has not played the same role at the U.K., or Germany, or France, or Belgium, in terms of the anti-ISIS coalition, in terms of air strikes in Syria and Iraq.

While there have been almost 1,000 British extremists who have gone and joined these various groups in Syria and almost 1,000 French, we've seen only about -- a little bit over 100 Spanish residents leave to go fight with groups like ISIS and Syria and Iraq.

But the threat is less acute than it is in some other European countries. But they've been grappling with a radicalization problem for decades, Wolf. And, of course, there worst terrorist attack since 911 on the west was the Madrid bombings in March of 2004, where over 190 people were killed.

So, this is not new to Spain. This is not new to Barcelona. It's been in the crosshairs of jihadi groups before. There was a plot all the way back in 2008, linked back to the Pakistani Taliban to bomb the Barcelona metro. There have been arrests in recent years in Barcelona linked to Islamic state extremism.

But at this point, we don't know the motive. There haven't been any eyewitness reports coming out yet of the attackers crying out any particular phrases or anything like that. And so investigators will be keeping an open mind about what this is at this stage.

BLITZER: Well, I just want to be precise. There have been other jihadi attacks, al Qaeda sympathizer attacks in Spain. But if this were in fact an ISIS-related, ISIS-organized or ISIS-inspired attack, would this be the first ISIS-related attack in Spain?

CRUICKSHANK: I believe it would. Certainly the mass casualty attack that we have not seen any mass casualty attacks in Spain related back to ISIS. So this would be a very significant moment, a very worrying moment for Spanish authorities.

But it comes, really, as no surprise to them. They've been preparing for this. They've known there's a threat out there. They've been stepping out their counter terrorism activity. There have been around a couple of hundred arrests of suspected Islamic extremists in the last few years since ISIS emerged in Syria and Iraq.

So no surprises here. They knew this day might come. But what quite we're dealing with at the moment, we don't yet know because there hasn't been any claim of responsibility. And this is really just minutes, still -- and, in fact, this attack may still be ongoing. BLITZER: Yes, the local police says at least one person dead. They do

expect that number to rise. Thirty-two injured. Many of them are in very serious condition in hospital.

Evan, you're getting more information?

PEREZ: Well, I just wanted to add real quick to what Paul Cruickshank was just saying. I mean this is something that we've been talking to officials and in law enforcements and in the intelligence community in the last few months. They were expecting a very active summer. This is, obviously, a time when ISIS is under retreat. A lot of the fighters, the European fighters that were there, are believed to have infiltrated back into Europe, melting back into European society.

And the concern and the fear was that we would see a lot of attacks this summer. It hasn't materialized as much as people thought. This is the first one this summer. Earlier we had the Borough market attack, obviously. There have been a number of other attacks.

But we've also had a couple of attacks by people who were simply mentally deranged and were using trucks to -- or cars to try to attack people. So we don't know exactly what this is, but it does bear the hallmarks of the great fear that you heard from law enforcement and from the intelligence community that this summer we were going to see a lot of this type of activity because you have so many of these jihadis who had gone overseas to Syria and Iraq and have returned back to Europe.

BLITZER: And this is a major tourist attraction, this area of Barcelona, where this van rammed into the pedestrians.

PEREZ: Right.

BLITZER: Our chief national security correspondent, Jim Sciutto, has been working his sources as well. What else are you hearing, Jim?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Well, Wolf, an eyewitness shared a video in the immediate minutes after the attack walking down the stretch of Las Ramblas, this tourist attraction in the middle of Barcelona, and just a tangle of bodies, Wolf. It was horrific to see. And the nature of the injuries so severe that it wouldn't be surprising to see the human toll of this rise.

And it was evocative of those pictures, you and I remember, our viewers remember as well, of the attack in Nice. A long stretch of street with a lot of bodies left in the trail of the vehicle. And -- it's -- the scale of this looks to be particularly alarming. That's one thing.

Two, Spain has not had the numbers that say France has had, for instance, in terms of jihadi suspects, et cetera, or volunteers for ISIS in Syria and Iraq. That said, I was speaking to a security source in Europe a short time ago who was just in Barcelona in March profiling what is still a large and insulated, isolated Muslim community there. Within it, a militant presence that authorities have been aware of. Typical for them to penetrate because of the insularity of that group. A number of Pakistani nationals, Moroccan nations, ties to Lashkar-e-Taiba, the very powerful Pakistani terrorist group. So it's not at the top of the list like Belgium, for instance, or France, it has had a presence and it's something that not just Spanish authorities but U.S. authorities have been aware of.

But the final point I would make, Wolf, is just this note. That in light of the uproar of the last several days, five days apart you have whites supremacists in Charlottesville use a vehicle to kill and here you have attackers at least following the modus operandi of terrorists using vehicles apparently to kill as well. And that -- those shared tactics that should be alarming.

[13:20:18] BLITZER: Yes, there will be questions about copycats. There will be questions if what happened in Barcelona was at all, at all, a copycat version of what happened in Charlottesville, Virginia. Even though they may be different characters, different political ambitions, they use the same killing device. A vehicle going at high speed into a group, a large group, of pedestrians. And as the local police are saying, at least one person is now dead, 32 injured, many of them in critical condition right now. They fully expect the death toll to go up.

No official statement yet from U.S. officials, although the Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the Secretary of Defense James Mattis, they've been meeting over at the state Department with Japanese -- their Japanese counterparts. They're going to be speaking shortly. We'll see if they do make a statement.

Let's take a quick break. We'll have special breaking news coverage right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in Japan speaking on this terror incident.

REX TILLERSON, SECRETARY OF STATE: Law enforcement, national security authorities in Spain, or consulates in Barcelona and our entire mission Spain team are currently assisting Americans in Spain who are affected by these events. We ask U.S. citizens in the area to let your loved ones know you are safe.

Terrorists around the world should know the United States and our allies are resolved to find you and bring you to justice.

Secretary Mattis and I are grateful for the opportunity today to host Foreign Minister Kono, and Defense Minister Inada today. The bonds of America and Japan have forged over previous decades will continue to endure. Today's honest and productive discussions reaffirmed our mutual commitment to confronting threats to region peace and security. As you might imagine, we spent a fair amount of time discussing North Korea.

North Korea's recent intercontinental ballistic missile and other missile launches are unacceptable provocations and they must stop immediately. We agreed to bolster our alliance --

BLITZER: All right, we're going to continue to monitor the Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. He's been meeting with his Japanese counterpart. Secretary of Defense James Mattis also there.

They -- but you did hear the secretary of state condemn what clearly is emerging as a terrorist operation in Barcelona when a large, white van at high speed rammed into a crowd of pedestrians killing at least one individual, although that death toll is expected to go up, injuring 32 others, several of them in critical condition in local -- in local hospitals right now.

Michael Holms is getting more information for us.

Michael, what else are you learning?

HOLMES: Yes, Wolf, I just heard that we're waiting for a Catalan government to make a statement as well. They've gone into an emergency session, obviously, to discuss this dreadful incident that's happened.

When you -- when you look at the -- from aerial shots of the -- the path that this van went, it went a long way down this pedestrian way, this Las Ramblas, which is about three quarters of a mile long. And the van travel a long way down that road, teeming with pedestrians. Eyewitnesses saying it was absolutely packed, as you can imagine, on a sunny summer's afternoon in a major tourist spot like Barcelona. And this is the most famous street in Barcelona for tourists. Packed with shops and bars and restaurants.

[13:25:26] And the van apparently plowing down the middle of Las Ramblas, swerving from side to side and taking out as many people as possible. In the aftermath, it was really a scene of carnage, of people lying on the road. Clearly some dead, or not moving, at least. Officially the death toll still only at one, with 17 injured, many of them in critical condition. But as Jim was saying and others have said too, it's fairly certain that death toll's going to go up from the images we've seen of the aftermath.

There's still the uncertainty over what's happening now. Eyewitnesses said the driver got out of the van and took off. And then there were these reports of two men, armed reportedly, going into a bar in the area and barricading themselves inside. Very little information since then on what is happening with that situation.

The terror alerts or protocols were activated very soon after this incident occurred, but authorities were very cautious not to call it a terror attack until about 30, 40 minutes ago. They actually said, this is a terror attack. So, obviously, intent involved. This was no accident. And authorities are still on the scene there trying to work out exactly how this happened.

A lot of people watching would have been there, too, Las Ramblas. I certainly haven't. It's a beautiful part of a beautiful city. And just a dreadful situation.

And as your guests have been saying, and Paul and Jim and others, this is just the latest in a series of these sorts of attacks, though, around Europe. The first in Barcelona from memory, but, of course, we saw what happened in Nice and we saw what also happened in Tunisia and then in London as well. This low-tech attack.

What is happening with these armed gunmen in this bar? We're yet to find out. But this could still be an ongoing situation, Wolf.

BLITZER: It seems sort of reminiscent -- and I know you covered it, I covered it, the terror attack in Nice, France, where a vehicle was used as a weapon, and, unfortunately, killed a lot of people.

HOLMES: Exactly. Yes, more than 80 people were killed in that attack, driving a truck down that thoroughfare in Nice on Bastille Day. A horrible, horrible incident.

But this sort of speaks to -- it speak to a couple of things, I think, Wolf. First of all, how comparatively, awful to say, but how easy it is to bring carnage and terror to the streets of any capital, but in this case a European -- a major European capital, with one van driving down a crowded area. It's part of the ISIS M.O. now. They've calmed on their people in Europe and elsewhere to do precisely this sort of attack.

And also the fact, too, now as ISIS is being squeezed in Iraq and also in Syria, that a lot of European ISIS members are heading home. And, you know, they've been urged to carry out attacks like this as well. You know, you don't need an automatic weapon to create carnage. You need a van and a crowded place. And unbelievably and tragically, it's that simple, Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, we did hear the U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson say this was an act of terror. They're investigating, they're urging all Americans citizens who may be in this very popular tourist area of Barcelona to stay away and stay away as quickly as possible.

We did just see a tweet from the first lady of the United States, Melania Trump. Here's her tweet. Thoughts and prayers to hash tag Barcelona. That's from Melania Trump, the first lady of the United States.

I quickly want to bring in CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roderick.

Art, this investigation clearly is only just beginning. No group has claimed responsibility for what clearly is a terror attack. This large white van plowing into a huge crowd of pedestrians going at high speeds. But as we've been pointing out, it does have all the hallmarks of at least, and we don't know this for sure, no one has claimed responsibility, some sort of ISIS-inspired event at a minimum.

[13:29:52] ART RODERICK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, absolutely, Wolf. I think the hard thing here is, these types of attacks are almost impossible to stop. They're very simple. They're using a vehicle, plowing through crowds. We just had this same incident happen in Charlottesville a few days ago and this is the scary part of it. Law enforcement instituted