Spanish police shoot man dead as he tries to attack officers with knife near Barcelona

A man armed with a knife was shot dead by police when he tried to attack officers near Barcelona.

Spanish police said the man entered the police station in Cornella, in the north-eastern region of Catalonia, at just before 5am BST on Monday "with the aim of attacking the agents".

A spokesman refused to comment on local media reports that the man was from Algeria and had shouted "Allahu akbar" (God is greatest) during the attack.

State broadcaster RTVE said the attacker was a 29-year-old Algerian resident in Cornella with Spanish identity documents.

"A man armed with a knife entered the police station in Cornella to attack the officers. The attacker was shot," the Catalonia regional police said on Twitter.

^{Cornella is around 10 miles from Barcelona}

Last Friday, Barcelona commemorated the first anniversary of an Islamist assault in which a young man drove a van down a busy central boulevard, killing 14 and injuring over 100 in Spain's worst attack in more than a decade. 

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant claimed responsibility for the attacks.