At least 39 killed after high-speed train collision in Spain, transport minister says
Emergency services work at the site of a train collision on January 19, 2026 after yesterday’s train collision in Adamuz, Spain. Authorities say at least 39 were killed and more than 150 were injured when a train collided with a derailed train on the evening of Sunday, Jan. 18. (Photo by Pablo Blazquez Dominguez/Getty Images)
(ADAMUZ, Spain) — At least 39 people were killed and about 152 others were injured after two high-speed trains collided in southern Spain on Sunday, according to officials.
A train traveling from Málaga to Madrid derailed near Adamuz, crossing over to the adjacent track where it hit another train coming from Madrid to Huelva, according to the Spanish Interior Minister.
The number of confirmed dead rose to 39 from the previously reported 21 and was “not final,” Oscar Puente, the Spanish transport minister, said in a statement early on Monday.
“I want to express all my gratitude for the huge effort of the rescue teams during the night, under very difficult circumstances, and my condolences to the victims and their families in these terribly painful moments,” he said in Spanish on social media.
Spain’s prime minister is expected to visit the crash site this morning.
Officials had earlier said that of those injured, 75 were hospitalized, with 15 in very serious condition and five in life-threatening condition.
Rescue crews are on the scene, and all trains between Madrid and the Andalusia region are suspended, according to officials.
The cause of the train derailment has not yet been released.
Iryo, the company operating the train that initially derailed, released a statement, saying the company “deeply regrets what has happened and has activated all emergency protocols, working closely with the competent authorities to manage the situation.”
The company said there were 300 passengers on the train at the time.
Puente, the transport minister, spoke to reporters late Sunday night and the high-speed Iryo train was “relatively new.”
Puente said the derailment of the Iryo train bound for Madrid and its subsequent collision with the second train happened on a straight stretch of track, which had undergone extensive renovation work that was only finished in May.
The Spanish minister called the accident “extremely strange.”
“It’s very difficult at this moment to explain,” Puente added, and said he hoped the investigation would help clear up what has happened.
ABC News’ Joe Simonetti contributed to this report.
An unknown number of students and staff were kidnapped by unidentified gunmen in an attack on a Catholic boarding school in western Nigeria early Friday, authorities said. (Nigeria Police Force Niger State Command)
(MAIDUGURI, Nigeria and LONDON) — An unknown number of students and staff were kidnapped by unidentified gunmen in an attack on a Catholic boarding school in western Nigeria early Friday, authorities said.
The incident occurred before dawn, around 2 a.m. local time, at St. Mary’s School in the Papiri community of the Agwara local government area in Niger state, according to the Nigeria Police Force’s Niger State Command, which said in a statement that “armed bandits” had “abducted a yet to be ascertained number of students from the school’s hostel.”
“Police tactical units, military components and other security agencies have moved to the scene, combing the forests with a view to rescue the abducted students,” police added.
The Niger state government also confirmed in a statement that it “has received with deep sadness the disturbing news of the kidnapping of pupils from St. Mary’s School in Agwara Local Government Area,” adding that the “exact number of abducted pupils is yet to be confirmed as security agencies continue to assess the situation.”
The statement noted that the “unfortunate incident comes despite prior intelligence” warning of heightened threats in part of Niger state and the governor” ordering the temporary closure of all boarding schools within the affected zone as a precautionary measure.”
“Regrettably, St. Mary’s School proceeded to reopen and resume academic activities without notifying or seeking clearance from the State Government, thereby exposing pupils and the staff to avoidable risk,” Abubakar Usman, secretary to the Niger state government, said in the statement.
Local media reports say a roll call at the school revealed that 52 students are missing as well as a number of staff. ABC News is working to confirm this.
It’s the latest in a string of recent attacks by armed groups across Nigeria, including Monday’s kidnapping of 25 schoolgirls in nearby Kebbi state. The incidents have prompted Nigerian President Bola Tinubu to postpone planned trips abroad.
Viktor Kovalchuk/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images
(LONDON) — President Donald Trump and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin spoke on Thursday, the White House said, ahead of Trump’s in-person meeting on Friday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Trump, in a social media post, called it a “productive” conversation and said he and Putin would eventually meet again — in Budapest, Hungary, at an unspecified time. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters the call lasted more than two hours.
“At the conclusion of the call, we agreed that there will be a meeting of our High Level Advisors, next week,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. “The United States’ initial meetings will be led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, together with various other people, to be designated. A meeting location is to be determined. President Putin and I will then meet in an agreed upon location, Budapest, Hungary, to see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ War, between Russia and Ukraine, to an end.”
ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Mary Bruce asked Leavitt if Trump still believed he could get Putin and Zelenskyy in a room together, after he couldn’t reach that step after hosting Putin for a summit in Alaska in August.
“I think he thinks it’s possible, and he would of course love to see that happen,” Leavitt said. “But right now, there were discussions and plans are now being made for the Russian side and our folks, led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, to meet and then for President Putin and President Trump to perhaps meet again. But I don’t think the president has closed the door on that at all.”
Russia overnight fired more than 300 drones and about three dozen missiles at targets throughout Ukraine, including civilian energy infrastructure, Zelenskyy said on Thursday.
The strike also targeted the State Emergency Service department in the Kharkiv region, he said.
“There are wounded,” Zelenskyy said on social media. “Recovery efforts are underway everywhere. Emergency services are working.”
Zelenskyy, who is scheduled on Friday to meet Trump at the White House, said on Thursday that the ongoing strikes only showed that the West needed to continue applying “pressure” on Russian President Vladimir Putin.
That pressure included continuing to update sanctions, but, he said, it could also include longer-range capabilities for the Ukrainian military to strike targets farther into Russia.
“Strong decisions are possible, decisions that can help. And this depends on the United States, on Europe, on all partners whose strength directly determines whether the war will be ended,” Zelenskyy said.
He added, “Now there is an important momentum toward peace in the Middle East. In Europe, this is also possible. That is exactly what I will be discussing today and tomorrow in Washington.”
The Kremlin on Wednesday also addressed the potential for the West to supply weapons for or to greenlight longer-range Ukrainian strikes within Russia.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was quoted in Tass, a Russian state-affiliated media outlet, saying that deliveries of U.S.-made Tomahawks would amount to a “dangerous escalation of tensions” between Russia and the United States.
The Russian strike on Ukraine overnight targeted several Ukrainian regions — with a focus on the Poltava and Kharkiv regions — with a total of about 320 drones, about 200 of which were Shahed attack drones, the Ukrainian air force said. About 37 missiles were also fired, the military said.
Most of those aerial attacks were thwarted by Ukraine or otherwise failed, the air force said. Thirty-seven drones and 14 missiles made it through Ukraine’s air defenses, the military said.
The Russian Ministry of Defense also reported downing at least 51 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory. Local authorities said the electricity supplies to several settlements in the Volgograd, Voronezh and Belgorod regions were disrupted by the Ukrainian attacks.
Trump on Wednesday said during an Oval Office press conference that he thought Russia and Ukraine were close to a ceasefire deal about two months ago, blaming the impasse on animosity between Zelenskyy and Putin.
“You know, it’s an obstacle. It’s an obstacle,” Trump said. “There’s no question about it.”
ABC News’s Lalee Ibssa, Joe Simonetti and Will Gretsky contributed to this report.
[Editor’s Note: This story includes graphic descriptions of alleged torture.]
(NEW YORK) — The bodies of some unidentified Palestinians handed over by Israel as part of the ceasefire agreement showed severe signs of torture, according to an aid worker who inspected at least 10 bodies.
“People’s bodies were covered in scars and what looked like open wounds. … It was just horrific,” Moureen Kaki, a Palestinian American activist and aid worker with medical charity Glia, told ABC News.
The bodies had signs of binding the hands and feet, contortion of limbs, cut off fingertips and disfigured heads, according to Kaki. Their hands had “gone stiff” and were “fixed” in a contorted position “as if they’d been that way for a long time,” she noted.
Kaki told ABC News she has not yet formally reported the alleged torture to a government or humanitarian agency.
Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire deal that involved a hostage exchange earlier this month. All remaining living hostages held by Hamas have been turned over to Israel and Hamas said it is continuing to search for the bodies of some deceased hostages.
Under the ceasefire agreement, Israel also turned over living and dead Palestinians in its custody.
The Israel Defense Forces rejected the allegations of torture and told ABC News that it operates “strictly in accordance with international law,” in a statement last week.
The type of scarring on the unidentified Palestinian bodies was “pretty consistent across most of them” and several bodies had “what looked like gunshot wounds in their legs,” according to Kaki.
“Probably about six” of the corpses she looked at had fingers missing, she noted.
“Every single person that I looked at had their hands and feet bound, or like traces of their hands or feet were bound in some way,” Kaki said.
In its statement rejecting allegations of torture, the IDF said it “did not tie any bodies prior to their release to the [Gaza] Strip.”
The bodies were returned by Israel without names and some had numbers “spray-painted” onto them, according to Kaki, who spoke from inside Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. She has been based in Gaza non-stop since June 2024.
The corpses examined had possibly been held by Israel for as long as two years, Kaki noted.
The bodies had decomposed to some extent by the time she examined them, but medical professionals from Nasser Hospital believe that some sort of preservation process had been applied to the corpses while they were held by Israel, Kaki said.
Asked how confident she could be that the bodies had evidence of torture, Kaki said, “I would say 99% [sure] and the only 1% is that I didn’t see it [the alleged torture] with my own eyes.”
The Nasser Hospital medical professionals who inspected the bodies told her “that this was clearly torture and that most of it, if not all of it, was done while these people were still alive,” Kaki said.
ABC News has reviewed graphic images of corpses obtained by Kaki. The photos were taken from a Palestinian journalist whom Kaki said was present when she examined the bodies. The images appeared to back up her account.
More than 1,900 living Palestinian prisoners and detainees who were released by Israel under the ceasefire agreement. Kaki said she spoke to 35 former detainees who said they had experienced torture.
She also examined wounds on their bodies and, according to Kaki, their accounts “lined up very clearly with what their bodies showed.”
The IDF described the allegations as “false propaganda” and said “all of the [Palestinian] bodies returned [to Gaza] so far are from combatants within the Gaza Strip.”
A mass burial was held for 54 unidentified Palestinians in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza last week.
Kaki said she believed authorities in Gaza were ultimately unable to identify the bodies returned due to their deformities and injuries.
