Eight days after Madrid train bombings killed more than 200 people, EU governments agreed in principle today to name an official to co-ordinate anti-terrorism activities across the European Union.

THE massive multinational probe into the Madrid bombings made significant progress yesterday, with police in Spain arresting five more suspects and bringing five others before a judge.

Traumatised by terrorism, Spaniards today prepared for general elections as a nation in grief, with the ruling party favoured to win and insisting that Basque separatists remain the prime suspect in the rail bombings that killed 199 people.

Police probing the Madrid terrorist attacks have found a van with detonators and an Arabic-language tape with Koranic verses – and officials don’t rule out any line of investigation, Spanish Interior Minister Angel Acebes said tonight.

Tony Blair led British condemnation today of the Spanish rail bombings that killed more than 170 and injured another 600.

Powerful bombs ripped through three busy Madrid railway stations today just three days before general elections, killing at least 173 rush-hour commuters and wounding more than 600 in Spain’s worst terrorist attack.

Powerful explosions rocked three Madrid rail stations today – just three days before Spain’s general election – killing at least 131 rush-hour commuters and wounding more than 400 in what officials called the deadliest attack ever by the Basque separatist group ETA.

The armed Basque terror group Eta unilaterally declared a ceasefire in Spain’s north-eastern region of Catalonia today.

EXPLOSIVE and chemical attacks planned for continental Europe and London, were foiled by police raids in two countries yesterday.

Hospitalet De Llobregat

Police have captured an armed man who had taken 25 children hostage at a school near Barcelona.

Ciaran Giles, SPAIN has activated a costly system of radars and extra-sensitive cameras with night vision along its southern coast in a bid to crack down on trafficking of immigrants and drugs between Morocco and Spain, the government said yesterday.

Spanish police arrested three suspected members of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network yesterday, one of whom had videotaped key buildings in the US, Interior Minister Angel Acebes said.