Russian officials said Tuesday that Ukrainian attacks involving more than 90 drones killed at least one person and injured three others in the Moscow region.

The assault was part of an overall attack overnight that included more than 300 Ukrainian drones targeting 10 Russian regions stretching from border areas to the Russian capital.

Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the Moscow region, said on Telegram that in addition to those hurt, there was also damage to an apartment building from falling drone debris.

The attack also forced flight restrictions at Moscow airports and interrupted train services.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said it shot down 91 drones in the Moscow area, and a total of 337 across all regions.

The ministry said it intercepted 126 drones over the Kursk region, 38 over Bryansk, 25 over Belgorod, 22 over Ryazan and others over Kaluga, Lipetsk, Oryol, Voronezh and Nizhny Novgorod.

Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram that drone debris knocked out power to some part of his region and damaged multiple residential buildings.

Officials in Kaluga also reported damage to several buildings, while one person was reported hurt in Lipetsk.

Some information for this story was provided by The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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Russian documentary filmmaker Vitaly Mansky produces Artdocfest, an annual film festival that showcases documentary features from independent film directors. He says most documentary films reflect the negative impact of the war in Ukraine, from resettling Ukrainian refugees to daily struggles of Russians who fled the war and try to set up their life anew in other countries.

Click here for the full story in Russian. 
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Russia said Monday it was expelling two British diplomats based at the embassy in Moscow over spying allegations that the U.K. called “malicious and baseless.” 

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said in a statement quoted by the state news agency RIA Novosti that the two diplomats had provided false personal data while seeking permission to enter the country and had engaged in alleged intelligence and subversive activities that threatened Russia’s security. It didn’t offer any evidence. 

According to the RIA Novosti report, a decision has been made to revoke the diplomats’ accreditations, and they have been ordered to leave Russia within two weeks. The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a separate statement that it summoned a British Embassy official. “Moscow will not tolerate the activities of undeclared British intelligence officers on Russian territory,” it said. 

The Foreign Office in London said in a statement: “This is not the first time that Russia has made malicious and baseless accusations against our staff.” It did not say whether the U.K. planned any retaliatory moves. 

The FSB last year accused seven British diplomats of spying. Six expulsions were announced in September, and one more in November. The U.K. called the moves at the time “baseless.” The expulsions came amid soaring tensions over the war in Ukraine and after London decided to revoke the credentials of an attaché at the Russian Embassy and limit Moscow’s diplomatic activities in Britain. 

Last month, London expelled a Russian diplomat in response to the November expulsion. 

In May 2024, the U.K. expelled Russia’s defense attaché in London, alleging he was an undeclared intelligence officer, and it closed several Russian diplomatic properties in Britain that it said were being used for spying. Days later Russia reciprocated and expelled Britain’s defense attaché. 

Expulsions of diplomats — both Western envoys working in Russia and Russians in the West — have become increasingly common since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. 

In 2023, the Russian news outlet RBC said Western countries and Japan had expelled a total of 670 Russian diplomats between the start of 2022 and October 2023, while Moscow responded by expelling 346 diplomats. According to RBC, that was more than in the previous 20 years combined.
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Berlin — A one-day strike by workers at 13 German airports, including the Frankfurt and Munich hubs and all the country’s other main destinations, caused the cancelation of most flights on Monday.

The 24-hour walkout, which started at midnight on Sunday, involves public-sector employees at the airports as well as ground and security staff.

At Frankfurt Airport, 1,054 of the day’s 1,116 scheduled takeoffs and landings had been canceled, German news agency dpa reported, citing airport traffic management.

All of Berlin Airport’s regular departures and arrivals were canceled, while Hamburg Airport said no departures would be possible. Cologne/Bonn Airport said there was no regular passenger service and Munich Airport advised travelers to expect a “greatly reduced flight schedule.”

The ver.di service workers union’s strike also targeted the Bremen, Hannover, Duesseldorf, Dortmund, Leipzig/Halle and Stuttgart airports. At the smaller Weeze and Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden airports, only security workers were called out.

The German airports’ association, ADV, estimated that more than 3,500 flights in total would be canceled and about 560,000 passengers affected.

The union announced the strike last Friday. But at Hamburg Airport, it added a short-notice walkout on Sunday to the strike on Monday, arguing that it must ensure the measure was effective.

The so-called “warning strike,” a common tactic in German wage negotiations, relates to two separate pay disputes: negotiations on a new pay and conditions contract for airport security workers, and a wider dispute over pay for employees of federal and municipal governments.

The latter already has led to walkouts at Cologne/Bonn, Duesseldorf, Hamburg and Munich airports. Pay talks in that dispute are due to resume on Friday, while the next round of talks for airport security workers is expected to start on March 26.
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Paris — France is preparing a new military aid package for Ukraine worth more than $211 million from the interest earned on frozen Russian assets, its defense minister said in an interview published Sunday.

Sebastien Lecornu, a close ally of President Emmanuel Macron, in the interview with the Tribune Dimanche newspaper, described the suspension of U.S. weapons deliveries to Ukraine as a “heavy blow” to Kyiv’s fight against the Russian invasion.

“This year we will mobilize, thanks to the interests of frozen Russian assets, a new package of 195 million euros ($211,253,250)” for Ukraine, he said.

This will enable the delivery of 155-millimeter shells as well as AASM air to surface weapons that arm the French Mirage 2000 fighter jets that Paris has delivered to Ukraine for the war.

Lecornu did not make any comment on whether France would consider using the frozen Russian assets themselves to help Kyiv, a potentially far more significant move supported by its ally the U.K. but over which Paris as so far been wary.

But he warned that away from the battlefield, the “Russians are reinventing war, that is their great strength” by targeting “our democracy and our economy.”

France’s next 2027 presidential elections “could be the subject of massive manipulations as was the case in Romania” where the first round was topped by a far-right outsider, only for the results to be annulled by the Constitutional Court, he said.

He sought to play down any rupture in transatlantic relations after Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency and changed Washington’s policy on Ukraine, saying: “For my part, I still consider them as allies, despite their great unpredictability.”

Turning to the “heavy blow” of the U.S. suspension of weapons deliveries to Ukraine, he said: “They (Ukraine) can hold out for a while, but this suspension must not last.”

Lecornu said that French intelligence had no indication that Russia was planning to attack a NATO member in the next five years but did say there is a “temptation to destabilize Moldova” through its breakaway region of Transnistria.

With Macron and others urging EU states to ramp up defense spending as the U.S. wavers, Lecornu pointed to ammunition and electronic warfare as the most urgent issues for France’s military in the years to come.  

“Second priority, is the drone-ization and robot-ization of armies,” he added, also noting the roles of artificial intelligence and space.
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Even as U.S.-led peace negotiations to end Russia’s war on Ukraine recently faced setbacks, talks between Washington and Kyiv are set to take place this week in Saudi Arabia. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias has details.
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State Department — U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will arrive in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on Monday for U.S.-Ukraine talks as President Donald Trump pushes to broker a swift end to the Russia-Ukraine war.

While in Jeddah, Rubio will also meet with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud to discuss ways to advance shared interests in the region and strengthen the U.S.-Saudi relationship, said State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce.

According to the State Department, Rubio has “underscored President Trump’s determination to end the war as soon as possible and emphasized that all sides must take steps to secure a sustainable peace” in a Friday call with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha.

On Monday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will visit the Gulf kingdom for a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Afterward, a Ukrainian diplomatic and military delegation led by Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, will remain in Saudi Arabia for talks with U.S. officials. The Ukrainian team will also include Sybiha, Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, and military commander Pavlo Palisa.

Rubio will join U.S. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, for the Jeddah talks with Ukrainian officials.

Witkoff has told reporters that “the idea is to get down a framework for a peace agreement and an initial ceasefire as well.”

The U.S.-Ukraine talks will take place three weeks after senior U.S. officials held talks with Russian officials in Riyadh.

Ukraine said it is “fully committed” to constructive dialogue with the U.S. and hopes to “discuss and agree on the necessary decisions and steps.”

“Ukraine has been seeking peace from the very first second of this war. Realistic proposals are on the table. The key is to move quickly and effectively,” Zelenskyy wrote in a post on X on Saturday.

G7 foreign ministers

Following his visit to Saudi Arabia, Rubio will travel to Charlevoix, Canada, for the Group of Seven (G7) foreign ministers’ meeting from March 12 to 14.

In a joint statement following talks on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference in February, G7 foreign ministers underscored their commitment to helping “achieve a durable peace” and “reaffirmed the need to develop robust security guarantees” for Ukraine.

“Any new, additional sanctions after February should be linked to whether the Russian Federation enters into real, good-faith efforts to bring an enduring end to the war against Ukraine,” the joint statement added.
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ASHBOURNE, ENGLAND — This ancient form of football has a rule forbidding players from murdering each other.

Every year, thousands of people descend on a small town in the English countryside to watch a two-day game of mass street football that, to the casual observer, could easily be mistaken for a riot. This is Royal Shrovetide — a centuries-old ball game played in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, that, frankly, looks nothing like the world’s most popular sport. Or any other game for that matter.

“It’s like tug of war without the rope,” says Natalie Wakefield, 43, who lives locally and has marshaled the event in the past. “It’s mad in the best possible way.”

Hundreds of players

Played between two teams of hundreds of players, the aim is to “goal” at either end of a 5-kilometer sector that could take the match through rivers, hedgerows, high streets and just about anything or anywhere except for churchyards, cemeteries and places of worship. The ball is thrown into a crowd that moves like a giant herd, as each team tries to carry it toward their desired goal.

Rules are limited but “no murder” was an early stipulation for the game that dates back to at least the 1600s. Good players need to be “hard, aggressive and authoritative,” says Mark Harrison, who “goaled” in 1986 and is one of multiple generations of scorers in his family.

“You can’t practice,” the 62-year-old Harrison adds. He stopped competing seven years ago and now serves up burgers to throngs of spectators from a street food truck.

“You’ve just got to get in there and be rough. I am a rugby player … I’m also an ex-boxer so that helps.”

Royal approval

Harrison had the honor of carrying the then-Prince Charles on his shoulder when in 2003 the now-King of England opened that year’s game. “He loved it!” Harrison says.

Played over Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday each year, the event is a source of immense pride for the people of Ashbourne in Derbyshire’s Peak District.

Yet, such a unifying tradition is actually based upon splitting the town into two halves between the “Up’ards” and the “Down’ards,” determined by whether players are born on the north or south of the River Henmore.

Don’t park there

On any other days, Ashbourne, around a three-hour drive from London, is quiet and picturesque with a high street lined by antique shops, cafes and traditional pubs. Visitors include hikers, cyclists and campers.

For two days that all changes.

Large timber boardings are nailed up to protect shop fronts. Doorways are barricaded. “Play Zone” signs are strapped to lampposts, warning motorists not to park there for fear of damage to vehicles, which can be shoved out of the way by the force of the hoards of players trying to move the ball.

In contrast, colorful bunting is strewn high above from building to building and revelers congregate, eating and drinking as if it is a street party. Parents with babies in strollers watch on from a safe distance. School holidays in the area have long since been moved to coincide with the festival.

“There are people who come and they have a drink and they’re just like, ‘This is a bit of a crazy thing and it’s a spectacle, and now I’ve seen it, box ticked off,'” says Wakefield, who also used to report on Royal Shrovetide for the local newspaper. “And there are people who are absolutely enthralled by it all, and they get the beauty and complexity of the game and those people follow it year on year.”

Where’s the ball?

Play begins with an opening ceremony in a car park, no less, in the center of town. The national anthem and Auld Lang Syne are sung. Competitors are reminded, “You play the game at your own risk.” A leather ball, the size of a large pumpkin, filled with cork and ornately painted, is thrown into what is called a “hug” of players. And they’re off.

As a spectator sport, it can be confusing. There can be little to see for long periods during the eight hours of play each day from 2 p.m. local time. Players wear their own clothes — such as random football or rugby jerseys — rather than matching uniforms.

On Tuesday, it took more than 45 minutes to move the ball out of the car park. Onlookers stand on bins, walls and park benches, craning their necks to look down alleyways to try to get a better view. “Can you see the ball?” someone will ask. The answer is often “No.”

One person thinks it might be in line with a tree over to the right of the car park, but can’t be sure. Later that day there had been no sight of the ball for almost two hours until rumors started to circulate that the Down’ards scored what turned out to be the only goal over the two days of play for a 1-0 victory.

Deception and cunning

With so many players, the hug can be difficult to maneuver but gathers pace quickly, prompting crowds of spectators who’d previously been trying to get a closer look to suddenly run away from the action. The ball can be handled and kicked. Play can be frantic, with players racing after a loose ball wherever it may take them, diving into the river and up and out the other side.

While strength is needed in the hug, speed is required from runners if the ball breaks free. Royal Shrovetide, however, can be as much about deception and cunning as speed and strength, it seems.

“There’s a bit of strategy involved in that somebody’s pretending they’ve still got the ball in the middle of the hug,” Wakefield says. “And they’re quietly passing it back out to the edge to get it to a runner who has to sneak away in a kind of, I imagine, very nonchalant manner and then leg it down an alleyway.”

A famous goal in 2019 came as a result of the hug not realizing it didn’t have the ball until it was too late. Hidden by two schoolboys standing meters away, the ball was passed to a player who ran, largely unimpeded, for 2 1/2 kilometers before scoring.

A ball is goaled when it is hit three times against one of the millstones at either end of the town in Clifton or Sturston.

The beautiful game

Scorers have likened the achievement to winning Olympic gold. They are carried on shoulders, paraded through the town and celebrated like heroes.

“If you can imagine playing for Manchester United in their heyday and they’re at Wembley in a cup final. You score the winner. You’re there,” Harrison says. Scorers also get to keep the balls, which are repainted and become treasured family possessions.

It is the game, however, that is treasured most of all. “I just live and breathe it,” says Janet Richardson, 75, from Ashbourne, who has been going to Royal Shrovetide since she was a 1-year-old. “I can’t sleep because I’m excited. It’s so lovely to think that all these people still want to come here and watch this beautiful game that we’ve got in our town.” 
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KYIV, UKRAINE — Russia said Saturday its troops had retaken three villages seized by Ukraine in its Kursk border region, in a fresh setback for Kyiv ahead of talks to try to end the war. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday named a high-level delegation including ministers to meet U.S. negotiators in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, seeking to repair ties with U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration. 

U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff said Thursday that Washington wanted to discuss a “framework for a peace agreement.”   

“We hope to discuss and agree on the necessary decisions and steps,” Zelenskyy said, stressing that Ukraine was “fully committed to constructive dialogue.” 

But he condemned the “brutal” deadly strikes on eastern Ukraine, saying they proved that Russia was “not thinking about how to end the war.” 

Trump on Friday threatened new sanctions and tariffs against Russia over its bombardment of Ukraine. 

The three-year-long war is now at a critical juncture for Kyiv after Trump suspended U.S. military aid following his public falling-out with Zelenskyy last week.   

Ukraine still controls some 400-square kilometers in the Kursk region after launching an offensive last August. Zelenskyy sees this as a possible bargaining chip in peace talks. 

But Ukraine’s troops in Kursk have seen their position worsen in recent weeks with Russia’s army pushing back.   

Russia claims gains  

Russia’s defense ministry announced Saturday the recapture of three more villages: Viktorovka, Nikolaevka and Staraya Sorochina. 

According to DeepState, an online military tracker linked to the Ukrainian army, the Russian move followed a “breach” in the Ukrainian defense lines near the town of Sudzha, which is under Kyiv’s control. 

The advance appears to have cut off the logistics route needed by Ukraine to supply its troops, although Kyiv has not confirmed this. 

Russia has already taken back some two-thirds of the territory in Kursk initially seized by Ukraine.   

The Ukrainian military General Staff said Saturday that clashes were ongoing amid heavy bombardment with artillery and guided aerial bombs. 

Small groups of Russian troops have also mounted attacks in recent weeks into Ukraine’s Sumy region bordering Kursk.   

But Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation denied reports Saturday of a “massive breakthrough,” saying its forces were destroying small groups trying to cross.   

Meeting in Saudi Arabia 

Full peace negotiations remain a distant prospect, with Kyiv and Moscow making starkly opposed demands. Trump has made settling the conflict a priority since his return to the White House.   

But by reaching out to Russian President Vladimir Putin while criticizing Zelenskyy, he has raised fears in Kyiv — and among its European allies — that Trump may try to force Ukraine to accept a settlement that favors Russia. 

Senior U.S. and Ukrainian officials are set to meet for talks on the war in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday. Zelenskyy also will visit Monday for talks with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. 

For the U.S., Witkoff has said he wants to discuss an “initial ceasefire” with Russia and a “framework” for a longer agreement. 

Zelenskyy said Ukraine would be represented by officials including foreign minister Andriy Sybiha and Defense Minister Rustem Umerov.   

In his evening address, he told Ukrainians he was “confident that the meeting will be productive.”   

Zelenskyy also urged allies to “increase sanctions against Russia” after heavy overnight bombardment in the east and northeast.   

A Russian barrage hit the center of Dobropillya in the eastern Donetsk region late Friday, killing 11 people and wounding 40, according to the emergency services.   

“Russia is proving literally every day with its cruelty that nothing has changed for them,” Zelenskyy said. 

He accused Moscow of wanting to “destroy and capture more as long as the world allows them to wage this war.” 

On Saturday, a strike on the embattled city of Pokrovsk killed a man in his 40s and wounded 2 others, and at least 10 people were killed in multiple strikes on Ukraine’s embattled eastern Donetsk region, the Donetsk Governor Vadym Filashkin said. He added that seven others were killed in multiple drone and missile strikes in towns close to the front lines.  

Three people died when a Russian drone hit a workshop in the northeastern Kharkiv region, the head of its military administration, Oleh Syniehubov, said. And one additional man was killed by shelling in the region. 

More bombs 

The latest strikes came after EU leaders, shaken by the prospect of U.S. disengagement, agreed to boost the bloc’s defenses.   

Putin “has no interest in peace,” the European Union’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Saturday, reacting to the latest attacks. 

“We must step up our military support — otherwise, even more Ukrainian civilians will pay the highest price,” she added. 

Zelenskyy said Saturday that Ukrainian and British diplomats had held “highly productive” talks in Kyiv.   

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the latest Russian attacks were “what happens when someone appeases barbarians,” resulting in “more bombs, more aggression.”  
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ZURICH, SWITZERLAND — Swiss police said Saturday they had solved a kidnapping involving two dogs and a demand for ransom of 1 million Swiss francs (about $1.135 million). 

Zurich police said that two Bolonka dogs were stolen from the home of a 59-year-old man in Schlieren near Zurich last week, while the dog owner was away. 

When the man returned, the dogs were gone, and he found a letter demanding money to release the small dogs. 

Instead of paying the ransom, the man, who was not identified by name in line with Swiss privacy rules, called the police. 

During the investigation, police arrested a 30-year-old Norwegian man Thursday at Zurich Airport. Police said he was strongly suspected of being involved in the theft. 

Following further leads and cross-European cooperation, police in Poland then detained a 38-year-old suspect and discovered the kidnapped Bolonkas, which they returned safely to their owner Friday. 

Swiss police said the Norwegian is in custody in Switzerland and authorities in Poland are further investigating the Polish suspect. 

A Bolonka is a toy breed of dogs bred in Russia and sold for up to a couple of thousand dollars. 
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