Barcelona commemorates anniversary of 2017 terror attacks that killed 16 

Thursday, August 17, 2023, marks the sixth anniversary of the terror attacks that took place in Barcelona and Cambrils, leaving 16 dead and more than 140 people injured.

A commemorative event took place in the morning at Barcelona's Joan Miró mosaic on La Rambla boulevard, the place where the van that plowed through a busy crowd finally stopped. 

Survivors and relatives of victims laid white carnations while a cellist played the traditional Catalan song, 'El cant dels ocells' (The Song of the Birds).

Officials from the local council, Catalan, and Spanish governments attended Thursday's ceremony, including Catalan president Pere Aragonès, Catalan parliament speaker Anna Erra, and Barcelona mayor Jaume Collboni, among others, but no official statements were made.

At the end of the event, relatives of victims and survivors held an additional six minutes of silence in a protest for the years they say they have been ignored by politicians. 

An investigative committee 

The anniversary of the event coincided with the signing of a deal between pro-independence Junts and the Socialists to elect a speaker in Madrid that is set to include a congressional inquiry into 2017 terror events. The UAVAT association of terror victims welcomed the news, with adviser Robert Manrique stating it was "important to investigate and know what went wrong to not repeat the same mistakes."

One of the elements that Junts wants to clarify is the "link between the Spanish Intelligence Services (CNI) and the imam of Ripoll that orchestrated the attack, the information that authorities had, and why it was not prevented."

Another commemorative event was held by the Catalan Association of Terrorist Organization Victims (ACVOT), with the conservative People's Party, far-right Vox, and center-right Ciudadanos in attendance.

The president of AVCOT, José Vargas, asked that the Barcelona council and the Catalan government to be held accountable "for not listening to the recommendations of placing pylons" and said he thought "the investigative committee will not end up being formalized."

The attacks

Six years ago, a van sped through the middle of the pedestrianized area on Barcelona's La Rambla boulevard. The perpetrator fled by foot and killed another person in order to steal the victim's car to make an escape. 

Nine hours after the Barcelona attack, five men drove into pedestrians in the southern Catalonia beach town of Cambrils, killing one woman and injuring six others. All five of those attackers were shot and killed by police.

These events were orchestrated by a jihadist group based in Ripoll, in the Pyrenees, under the town's imam Abdelbaki Es Satty, who died alongside another member of the group in an accidental explosion in Alcanar, in southern Catalonia, on the eve of the attacks. 

The  remaining three terrorist group members were sentenced to up to 43 years behind bars by Spain's National Court.