Spanish football is bracing for one of its most high-stakes fixtures of the season, but a sudden and shocking dressing room incident at Real Madrid has thrown the club into chaos just 72 hours before they face Barcelona in a title-deciding El Clasico clash. Uruguayan midfielder Federico Valverde required hospital treatment for a head injury following a physical altercation with French teammate Aurelien Tchouameni, the club has confirmed. Real Madrid launched immediate internal disciplinary proceedings against both players after the incident, which unfolded at the team’s Valdebebas training complex. The club’s official statement confirms Valverde received a diagnosis of cranioencephalic trauma, a common form of concussion. Following evaluation, Valverde was sent home to recover in stable condition, with medical staff ordering a 10 to 14 day rest period to manage his injury. Multiple independent sports outlets have shared additional details from anonymous sources close to the club: BBC Sport reports Valverde was knocked unconscious during the confrontation, while ESPN notes the midfielder required stitches to close a wound from the incident. Tensions between the two players first emerged during a training session on Wednesday, according to multiple on-the-ground reports. While the initial verbal disagreement carried over into the dressing room after that day’s practice, no physical conflict broke out at that time. The confrontation escalated to violence Thursday after training concluded at Valdebebas, when Tchouameni initiated a new confrontation with Valverde that turned physical, multiple sources confirm. In the hours after the incident came to light, Real Madrid president Florentino Perez called an emergency high-level meeting with club leadership, interim head coach Alvaro Arbeloa, and team captain Dani Carvajal to address the situation. “The club will provide updates on the resolutions of both proceedings once the corresponding internal procedures have been completed,” the club said in its statement, leaving fans and analysts waiting for clarity on potential sanctions. BBC Sport has reached out to both club representatives and player agents for additional comment, but no further statements have been released as of publication. The timing of the incident could not be worse for Real Madrid, who face Barcelona at the Nou Camp this Sunday in a match that will decide the 2025-26 La Liga title. A failure to secure three points for Real will see Barcelona claim their second consecutive league championship with three matchweeks still left to play, putting the title out of Real’s reach. Multiple Spanish media outlets report that club staff have described the incident as the most serious internal conflict ever recorded at the Valdebebas training facility. Beyond the immediate disciplinary investigation, the altercation has also drawn attention to a pattern of growing unrest in the Real Madrid first team squad in recent days. This incident marks the third reported internal conflict at the club in a single week. Earlier in the same week, reports emerged of a separate altercation between Spanish left-back Alvaro Carreras and German defender Antonio Rudiger. Carreras later addressed the rumors in an Instagram statement, denying that the incident was as serious as reported. “In recent days, certain insinuations and comments about me have emerged that do not correspond to reality,” Carreras wrote. “My commitment to this club and to the coaches I have had has been complete from day one, and it will continue to be so. Since I returned [after spells at Manchester United and Benfica], I have always worked with the utmost professionalism, respect and dedication. I have fought very hard to fulfil my dream of returning home. Regarding the incident with a colleague, it is a specific matter of no relevance that has already been settled. My relationship with the whole team is very good.” The unrest has also extended to fan relations, with supporters voicing public criticism of star striker Kylian Mbappe this week after the forward took a short trip to Sardinia with his girlfriend during a scheduled recovery break from team activities.
标签： Europe
欧洲
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Trump’s ‘irresponsible war’ to blame for economic slowdown, German minister says
A fresh escalation in tensions between two key NATO allies has emerged after Germany’s top finance official blamed U.S. President Donald Trump’s handling of the war in Iran for a massive downward revision of the country’s projected tax revenues, piling more strain on already fractured transatlantic relations.
Lars Klingbeil, Germany’s finance minister, told reporters in Berlin that Trump’s “irresponsible war in Iran” has triggered a widespread global energy shock that has severely damaged German economic prospects. In response to shifting economic headwinds, German federal officials have cut their expected tax revenue forecasts for the 2026–2030 period by roughly €70 billion (equivalent to $82 billion or £60.52 billion). Klingbeil emphasized that the sharp downgrade makes clear how directly the ongoing conflict in the Middle East is weighing on Germany’s stagnant domestic economy.
Klingbeil’s remarks come just weeks after a public dispute between German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and President Trump that already led to a U.S. announcement of troop withdrawals from German soil. Last month, Merz drew Trump’s fury when he claimed the White House had been “humiliated” by Iranian negotiators, arguing that the U.S. had no clear exit strategy for the conflict and that Iran had outmaneuvered American diplomats. Merz added that it was humiliating for the U.S. to send negotiators to international talks only to return home without any tangible progress.
Trump hit back rapidly on his social platform Truth Social, dismissing Merz as misinformed, falsely claiming the German leader supported Iran developing nuclear weapons, and arguing that Germany’s own poor economic performance justified his criticism. The U.S. president doubled down on his rebuke, urging Merz to prioritize fixing Germany’s own domestic challenges – including immigration and energy policy – instead of criticizing U.S. foreign policy. Days after Merz’s original comments, the U.S. Department of Defense unveiled a plan to withdraw 5,000 American troops from Germany, a move linked to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. German defense officials have described the withdrawal as a foreseeable outcome of the growing diplomatic rift.
Currently, the U.S. maintains its largest European military footprint in Germany, with roughly 12,000 troops deployed in Italy and an additional 10,000 in the United Kingdom. Trump has a long record of criticizing NATO alliance members, and has repeatedly pressured European allies to back his efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global oil shipping chokepoint that has been effectively closed by Iran since the outbreak of hostilities. Roughly 20% of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas supplies transit through the strait, and the conflict has sent global energy prices skyrocketing, hitting Germany’s already fragile economy, which has struggled with stagnation, elevated energy costs and weak export demand for years.
Alongside other European nations, Germany has openly opposed the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran that began on February 28, warning that the conflict raises severe risks of a full-blown global economic recession. While Merz has repeatedly acknowledged that Trump’s policy agenda has opened a “deep divide” between the United States and Europe since he took office a year ago, the German chancellor has also made two trips to the White House in 12 months in an effort to repair damaged bilateral ties.
At present, a fragile ceasefire is in place between warring parties, framed as a stepping stone to a formal peace deal. President Trump claimed this week the conflict would end quickly, and Iranian officials have confirmed they are reviewing a U.S. peace proposal. However, negotiations have stalled amid a U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports, even as American work continues to clear the Strait of Hormuz to allow the nearly 2,000 commercial ships stranded in the Gulf since February to transit safely.
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An outsider artist takes the world’s biggest stage with the US Pavilion at the Venice Biennale
As the 2026 Venice Biennale prepares to open its gates to the global art world, self-taught American sculptor Alma Allen finds himself at the center of one of the world’s most prestigious contemporary art platforms — a spot he secured only after a turbulent, last-minute selection process that has stirred widespread criticism across the international art community.
A Utah-born sculptor who has built his three-decade career working independently from Mexico, Allen has long positioned himself as an outsider to the insular, clique-driven contemporary art establishment. Now, just days ahead of the Biennale’s official launch, he faces intense scrutiny from critics and art world observers alike, all eyes fixed on the U.S. Pavilion, the iconic Jeffersonian-style brick venue that hosts the American presentation every two years.
Controversy has shadowed the 2026 U.S. pavilion selection from the start, with many describing the process as uncharacteristically opaque. When the open call for the commission was revised, language centering diversity, equity and inclusion was removed, and replaced with a new mandate to promote “American values.” This shift led most major cultural institutions that typically compete for the coveted commission to step back, amid fears of being drawn into unseemly administrative politics.
The road to Allen’s appointment was rocky from the outset. The original planned exhibition, set to feature work by artist Robert Lazzarini and curated by art historian John Ravenal, had already secured U.S. State Department approval before it collapsed last September, when the project’s required institutional sponsor pulled its support. A subsequent attempt to attach the Lazzarini project to the newly created American Arts Conservancy (AAC) fell through, and within a short timeframe, the new lineup — AAC as sponsor, Jeffrey Uslip as commissioner, Allen as the exhibiting artist — was announced.
Ravenal, the curator behind the failed original project, has criticized the revised selection as highly irregular. He notes that after the original application deadline closed in July, there was no public committee vetting process, no open applications, breaking with 40 years of established open call and peer review practices for the U.S. pavilion. He has described Allen as “a pawn in this whole thing.”
Allen is no stranger to the backlash his participation has sparked, but he is firm in pushing back against claims of political influence. He stresses that the current U.S. administration has not interfered in his exhibition in any way, saying bluntly: “My art is not propaganda.”
This is the first time in Allen’s 30-year career that he has felt the need to defend his practice and his place in a major show. For three decades, he worked largely outside the constant critical gaze of the mainstream art world, a circumstance he calls a genuine pleasure. His practice centers on organic, biomorphic sculptures carved from wood, shaped from stone, and cast in bronze. He intentionally refuses to title most works, choosing instead to leave space for viewers to bring their own interpretations to each piece.
Allen’s exhibition, titled *Call Me the Breeze*, brings together a dozen brand-new works alongside pieces he created over the past two decades. The title, he explains, is a nod to his lifelong ability to navigate unexpected obstacles — a skill he developed as a self-taught artist who has rarely benefited from institutional support throughout his career. Uslip, the pavilion’s commissioner, says that exact independent, non-institutional background is what made Allen the right choice for the commission. “I am deeply interested and invested in artists who are not, I guess, academicized … or lobotomized,” Uslip explained.
In a playful, ironic touch that nods to the controversy surrounding the show, Allen installed a large cast bronze evil eye on the exterior of the U.S. pavilion, a talisman he joked would ward off negative energy. In a fittingly chaotic twist, the piece was stuck in transit and failed to arrive just days before the opening.
Inside the pavilion’s central courtyard, a headless, directionless sheep sculpture stands as a quiet self-portrait, representing Allen’s status as the outsider shunned for being “the wrong sheep.” His newest body of work includes bronze wall sculptures, treated with chemical processes that turn the rigid metal into a spontaneous, fluid medium he compares to watercolor.
Allen’s path to the Venice Biennale is a story of unconventional persistence. Early in his career, he experienced homelessness in New York City, selling his small creations from an ironing board as an act of sheer desperation — a step that launched his career, connecting him with his first collectors. Today, his work is held in major institutions including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Palm Springs Art Museum; he previously took part in the 2014 Whitney Biennial, and made his European debut in Brussels in 2022.
When Allen received the last-minute commission, he made his first ever trip to Venice that November to walk through the pavilion. A trip to the Venice Accademia to see Hieronymus Bosch’s *The Visions of Hereafter*, a haunting work depicting heaven, hell and purgatory, inspired the exhibition’s core structure. “I wanted there to be a bit of the chaos that we go through,” Allen said of the show’s framework.
Looking back on the chaotic path that brought him to the Biennale, Allen says his selection came down to one key trait: his willingness to step into high-pressure, last-minute challenges. “When they do, I’m prepared to try it, and fail at it. That’s fine,” he says. Now, as opening day approaches, the outsider artist is ready to meet the world’s critical gaze with the same quiet adaptability that has defined his decades-long career.
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Rosenberg: Russia’s Victory Day parade with no tanks a sign Ukraine war not going to plan
Moscow’s iconic Red Square is blanketed in symbols of celebration this week, with giant crimson banners emblazoned with the word *Pobeda* – Victory – hanging over its cobblestones, digital screens flashing the same national rallying cry, and interactive art installations drawing crowds of locals snapping selfies with the iconic word. Behind metal barricades sealing off the central parade route, uniformed soldiers run through final rehearsals for Russia’s most sacred national holiday: the annual May 9 parade commemorating the Soviet Union’s 1945 defeat of Nazi Germany. For nearly a quarter century under Vladimir Putin, this date has grown into the beating heart of Russian national identity, a cornerstone of the country’s ideological framework that ties modern Russia directly to the sacrifices and triumph of the Great Patriotic War.
But this year, a historic shift is underway: for the first time in nearly 20 years, the parade will proceed without its most dramatic centerpiece – heavy military hardware. No battle tanks, no intercontinental ballistic missiles, no armored fighting vehicles will roll across Red Square this year. Only marching infantry will take part, in a dramatic scaling back of the traditional event that experts and analysts say offers a clear window into the current reality of Russia’s more than four-year-long full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The reasoning offered by Russian officials is straightforward: the country’s military equipment is already committed elsewhere. “Our tanks are busy right now,” ruling party MP Yevgeny Popov explained in an on-the-record interview. “They are fighting. We need them more on the battlefield than on Red Square.” When pressed on the fact that after more than four years of war, Russia has failed to achieve its original invasion goals and the parade cutback is widely seen as a sign of weakness, Popov pushed back, blaming Western and Ukrainian military support for the decision. “What other choice do we have? Nato countries, Ukraine and Great Britain’s weapons, your king and your prime minister, are threatening us.”
Beyond the immediate need for equipment at the front, Russian officials have also justified the scaled-back event citing rising domestic security threats. In the weeks leading up to May 9, Ukraine has stepped up long-range strikes deep inside Russian territory, bringing the war closer to Moscow than ever before. Just days before the parade, a drone managed to penetrate Moscow’s layered air defense systems and strike a luxury high-rise apartment building located just six kilometers from the Kremlin. While no fatalities were reported, the strike caused extensive damage to an upper floor of the building. A separate long-range missile and drone assault on the central Russian city of Cheboksary left two civilians dead and more than 30 others wounded.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has framed the parade cutback as a necessary response to what he calls a “terrorist threat” from Ukraine. In a sharp warning to Kyiv, Russia’s defense ministry has threatened an overwhelming retaliatory response, promising a “massive missile strike” on central Kyiv if Ukraine launches any attacks on Moscow during the May 9 holiday.
On side streets near Red Square, public opinion on the absence of military hardware is divided, reflecting growing undercurrents of war fatigue across the country. Many Russians acknowledge the safety argument, but express discomfort with what the cutback signals to the world. “There is a safety issue,” said Muscovite Sergei. “But parading our military hardware shows our strength on the world stage. Perhaps we should be displaying something.” Another local, Yulia, added: “I understand it would be foolish to showcase hardware in case something happens during the parade. On the other hand, this means that we are afraid of something. And that’s not great, either.” For Vladimir, another resident, the change is just a pragmatic response to shifting circumstances. “The parade, of course, is a symbol. But if circumstances don’t allow it to take place in full, we’ll have to wait a year for that.”
Analysts note that the scaled-back parade is itself a powerful symbol of the current state of the war: more than four years after Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the conflict has already outlasted the entire four-year duration of the Soviet Union’s war against Nazi Germany, and a definitive Russian victory remains out of reach.
The shifting dynamic is also leaving its mark on Putin’s domestic standing. Recent polling, even from state-run Russian agencies, shows a gradual decline in the president’s approval rating. Late last year, Putin made frequent public appearances in military fatigues, projecting confidence as he met with top generals to discuss the war. In 2026, the “Commander-in-Chief” public persona has been far less visible. Conversations with ordinary Russians reveal growing fatigue with the ongoing conflict, rising anxiety over soaring cost of living, and widespread anger over repeated state-mandated internet restrictions implemented across the country in recent months.
Russian authorities have announced new mobile internet restrictions for central Moscow on Victory Day, framing the move as a necessary security measure to prevent drone attacks and sabotage. The restrictions mirror similar digital shutdowns that have been imposed in dozens of Russian cities and towns over the past year. When asked about the widespread public anger over the shutdowns, Popov dismissed the criticism: “It’s not your business, with all respect, what we are doing with our internet. It would be better to be with no internet than to be killed by a Ukrainian missile or drone.”
While the central Red Square parade has been scaled back, commemorations of the 1945 victory are still taking place across every region of Russia. Outside Moscow, in the upscale village of Rublyovo, schoolchildren gathered at the local Great Patriotic War memorial to lay red carnations in honor of the 27 million Soviet citizens who lost their lives in the conflict. Standing guard at the memorial were two masked combat veterans who recently returned from fighting in Ukraine, what the Kremlin still calls a “special military operation.” One of the veterans compared the current conflict to the 1941-1945 war against Nazi Germany. When pressed on the key difference – that in 1941 the Soviet Union was invaded, while in 2022 Russia launched an invasion of its neighbor – the veteran simply replied, “Russia is a country of victors. It always was and always will be.”
Yet even as the rhetoric of victory remains central to national messaging, four years into the full-scale invasion, that victory remains elusive for Russia on the battlefield.
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Portugal and Italy will not suspend digital border checks for Brits
As the European Union grapples with growing travel disruption stemming from its new border management framework, the European Commission has officially confirmed that Portugal and Italy have no plans to waive new mandatory biometric screening requirements for British citizens entering the Schengen Zone.
The confirmation comes on the heels of unsubstantiated media speculation that the two Southern European nations would follow Greece’s lead, which quietly suspended the new fingerprint and facial scan checks for UK nationals earlier this spring in a bid to avoid crippling summer travel gridlock. Neither Portuguese nor Italian officials had publicly confirmed the rumors prior to the Commission’s statement.
The new Entry-Exit System (EES), the EU’s digital overhaul of border processing, requires all short-term visitors from outside the European Union and European Economic Area to register their biometric data every time they enter or exit the Schengen free travel area. First launched in October last year, the system was scheduled to reach full operational capacity by April 10 of this year. While EU officials maintain the platform has largely performed as intended, widespread traveler accounts of multi-hour delays at border checkpoints have proliferated in recent months, with UK passengers disproportionately affected. In dozens of documented cases, delayed passengers have missed departing and connecting flights entirely.
One high-profile incident last month left more than 100 EasyJet passengers stranded in Milan’s Linate Airport after they missed their flight back to Manchester, caught in what the carrier called “unacceptable” passport processing queues. A separate incident at Milan’s Bergamo Airport saw a plane full of Ryanair passengers bound for Manchester also miss their departure due to EES-related backlogs, the airline confirmed.
In response to these mounting disruptions, Greek border authorities quietly stopped conducting mandatory biometric checks for UK citizens, despite the Greek government’s public claim that it had “successfully started the full operation of the Entry-Exit System.” The Commission confirmed this week that it has opened discussions with Greek officials to clarify the country’s deviation from EU rules and remind national governments of the bloc’s existing regulatory framework. Under current EES rules, temporary, limited suspensions of screening are permitted at specific border crossings only during exceptional circumstances, but blanket exemptions for entire nationalities over extended time frames are explicitly prohibited.
The Commission added that it remains in regular communication with all EU member states, including Portugal and Italy, to coordinate EES implementation. “The Portuguese and Italian authorities confirmed that they do not intend to exempt any nationality,” a Commission spokesperson said in an official statement.
The ongoing EES-related travel chaos comes as global airlines already face cascading headwinds, including skyrocketing jet fuel prices and widespread uncertainty over fuel supply security heading into the peak summer travel season. Global carriers have already cut more than 13,000 scheduled flights for May, accounting for roughly 1% of all planned global air travel for the month. Despite the mounting disruptions, UK officials have urged holidaymakers not to cancel or alter their existing travel plans, noting that the UK faces no current fuel shortage and that government contingency plans are in place to address emerging issues.
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Tenerife resident calls docking of hantavirus ship ‘reckless’
Residents of the popular Spanish holiday island of Tenerife, part of the Canary Islands archipelago, have lashed out at authorities over what they label a reckless decision to allow the passenger vessel MV Hondius to dock at the island’s port, raising urgent public health concerns over a potential hantavirus exposure risk. In on-the-record interviews with the British Broadcasting Corporation, local inhabitants expressed deep unease about the ship’s arrival, warning that the decision opens the door to a possible public health crisis that could upend both the local population and the island’s critical tourism industry. Hantavirus, a rare but potentially deadly pathogen spread primarily through contact with rodent excreta, can cause severe respiratory distress and organ failure in infected humans, making any potential outbreak a major worry for densely populated coastal communities that rely on steady streams of international visitors. Many local residents say they were given little to no advance warning about the ship’s docking, leaving them in the dark about what safety protocols are in place to mitigate any potential risk of transmission. The controversy has reignited long-simmering debates over how regional port and public health authorities balance the economic priorities of the cruise and passenger shipping sector against the fundamental right of local communities to safety and transparent communication about potential health hazards. As of the latest reports, authorities have not yet issued a formal public statement addressing the specific concerns raised by Tenerife residents over the MV Hondius docking.
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Disturbances and 127 arrests mar Paris party after PSG Champions League victory
Following Paris Saint-Germain (PSG)’s narrow 1-1 aggregate semi-final win over Bayern Munich that secured the club a spot in the May 30 UEFA Champions League final in Budapest, jubilant fan celebrations across the Paris region descended into pockets of destructive violence late Wednesday night, prompting a swift crackdown from French authorities.
The night began with widespread peaceful gatherings, as thousands of supporters poured into city streets to mark the club’s historic qualification. Even newly elected Paris Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire joined in the festivities, watching the match alongside hundreds of fans — many of them children — at the city’s Hôtel de Ville headquarters. French interior ministry officials confirmed that the vast majority of Wednesday’s celebrations concluded without any major incident.
But the mood shifted quickly in parts of central Paris, where unruly crowds set dozens of public waste bins and parked vehicles ablaze. Riot police were deployed in large numbers to disperse crowds attempting to approach PSG’s Parc des Princes stadium, firing tear gas to clear blocked areas. Officials also reported that a planned effort to shut down Paris’s busy périphérique ringroad was successfully foiled by law enforcement.
In an official statement to Europe 1 radio, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez publicly condemned the violent outbreaks, noting that this pattern of unrest following high-profile PSG victories has become an increasingly common problem. By the end of the night, authorities had arrested 127 people across the broader Paris region, 107 of whom were detained within city limits. A total of 34 people were injured in the clashes: 11 civilians, one with life-threatening wounds caused by a mortar firework, and 23 police officers who sustained minor injuries.
The violence also targeted public cultural spaces: renowned French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand confirmed that his open-air exhibition at Place de la Concorde was extensively vandalized, with every display panel overturned and many of his original works damaged beyond immediate repair.
Compared to the unrest that followed PSG’s 2025 Champions League final win against Inter Milan, Wednesday’s violence was far less severe. A year ago, related clashes across France left two people dead and resulted in hundreds of arrests, matching the scale of police deployment that secured the city during that match.
Looking ahead to the Champions League final later this month, where PSG will face Arsenal in Budapest, Mayor Grégoire has already announced plans to organize a large public fan zone in Paris to allow supporters to watch the match together safely. He noted that city officials will work to implement strict safety measures to ensure the event can proceed without incident. However, Minister Nuñez has pushed back against the plan, criticizing it as a unilateral proposal and warning that there is significant risk of renewed unrest. He made clear that authorities will not tolerate any further disturbances, promising a firm, aggressive response to any trouble that arises on final night.
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Russia says Ukraine launched a major drone attack after Moscow shunned ceasefire offer
In a sharp escalation of hostilities following a collapsed unilateral ceasefire bid from Kyiv, Ukraine launched one of its largest aerial assaults of the full-scale invasion overnight, with Russian defense officials confirming Thursday that air defense systems intercepted and destroyed 347 Ukrainian drones across more than 20 Russian regions, including the Moscow area.
This drone wave marks the second-largest Ukrainian aerial attack since Russia launched its full-scale incursion more than two years ago, falling just short of a record 389-drone assault carried out in March of 2024. The strike comes just days ahead of Russia’s annual Victory Day holiday on May 9, the country’s most important secular celebration marking the 1945 defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, which has been shrouded in heightened security threats this year.
The cycle of escalating attacks followed a series of overlapping ceasefire announcements that quickly fell apart. Earlier this week, Russia declared a unilateral two-day ceasefire for Victory Day on Friday and Saturday. In response, Ukraine announced it would suspend its own offensive operations starting at midnight Tuesday, framing the move as a goodwill gesture. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia immediately ignored the gesture, continuing strikes across Ukrainian territory, and Kyiv would respond in kind.
“Russia has not stopped any type of its military activity. Unfortunately, it has not stopped. Ukraine will act symmetrically,” Zelenskyy stated in his regular Wednesday evening video address to the nation.
Tensions have built steadily in the lead-up to this year’s Victory Day, with U.S.-led international peace efforts remaining stalled and Kyiv expanding its long-range strike capabilities against targets inside Russia. In response to growing security risks, Russian authorities have implemented sweeping restrictions and scaled back traditional holiday festivities in the capital.
On Thursday, Russian state media confirmed that all mobile internet and text messaging services will be shut down across Moscow on May 9, per an announcement from the country’s Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media. The blackout will only exempt a small pre-approved “white list” of state-run online services, while home wired internet and public Wi-Fi networks will remain operational, officials clarified.
In a break from nearly 20 years of tradition, Moscow’s iconic annual Victory Day parade will also exclude the display of tanks, ballistic missiles, and other heavy military equipment for the first time this year. Russian defense officials cited the “current operational situation” as justification for the change, while Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov directly placed blame on Kyiv for the scaled-back celebrations and heightened security measures, accusing Ukraine of engaging in “terrorist activity” in reference to repeated cross-border drone strikes.
As Ukrainian forces launched their massive overnight drone assault, Russia retaliated with its own wave of drone strikes on Ukrainian territory. Ukraine’s military reported early Thursday that its air defense systems had successfully downed 92 of the 102 Russian drones launched overnight. Russia retains a substantial numerical advantage in drone production, and regularly carries out mass attacks involving hundreds of unmanned aerial vehicles against Ukrainian infrastructure and military targets.
The latest escalation comes as both sides continue trading large-scale cross-border strikes amid a grinding frontline conflict, with no near-term prospect of a negotiated end to the war.
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Wembanyama shines as Spurs and Knicks win in play-offs
Fresh off making history as the NBA’s first ever unanimous Defensive Player of the Year, French phenom Victor Wembanyama delivered a dominant performance to power the second-seeded Western Conference San Antonio Spurs to a lopsided 38-point victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves, squaring their Western Conference Semifinals series at one game apiece. Just days after dropping Game 1 on their home court, the Spurs bounced back in emphatic fashion on Wednesday, outmuscling the Timberwolves to a 133-95 win that marked San Antonio’s highest single-game score in any NBA playoff matchup since 1983. By halftime, San Antonio had already built an insurmountable 59-35 lead – the lowest first-half point total Minnesota has allowed all season. Wembanyama, the 2023-24 breakout star, turned in a double-double of 19 points and 15 rebounds to anchor the blowout win, capping off another impressive showing that extends the Spurs’ remarkable run: the franchise has not dropped back-to-back games since mid-January, a 49-game stretch of consistent results that has positioned them as one of the league’s most dangerous playoff contenders. Speaking to reporters after the game, Wembanyama said he expected the sharp turnaround from both himself and his teammates, calling the response unsurprising. “There is some ego. They assaulted us in game one, we wanted to assault them in game two,” the French international added of the team’s motivating mindset. Across the country in the Eastern Conference Semifinals, the third-seeded New York Knicks held off a frantic back-and-forth battle to clinch a narrow 108-102 home win over the Philadelphia 76ers, taking a 2-0 series lead ahead of the matchup’s shift to Philadelphia for Game 3 this Friday. The 76ers were dealt a major blow hours before tipoff, when reigning MVP Joel Embiid was ruled inactive due to a combination of right hip soreness and a sprained right ankle. Without their star center, Philadelphia still pushed the Knicks to the final buzzer, in a game that saw 25 lead changes – the most lead swings in any NBA playoff game in the last 11 years. Knicks guard Jalen Brunson led the late charge for New York, scoring eight of his total 26 points in the fourth quarter to help the home side pull away in the final minutes. Forward Karl-Anthony Towns supported Brunson’s effort with a 20-point, 10-rebound double-double. For the short-handed 76ers, guard Tyrese Maxey stepped up to score a team-high 26 points, and the franchise remains hopeful Embiid will recover enough to suit up for Game 3 on Philadelphia’s home court.
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A fan-run soccer club pushes back against Poland’s nationalist stadium culture
In the heart of Warsaw, Poland, a community-led soccer club born out of fan resistance to toxic, nationalist-driven stadium culture is positioning itself as a critical counterpoint to shifting political and social tides in the country, even as Poland’s newly elected president openly acknowledges his history of involvement in football fan street violence.
Founded in 2015 by lifelong supporters of Warsaw’s two dominant professional clubs, Legia Warszawa and Polonia, AKS Zły — short for Alternatywny Klub Sportowy Zły, which translates to Alternative Sports Club Evil — emerged as a deliberate rejection of the pervasive hostility and aggression that organizers witnessed in and around Polish football stadiums. More than a decade after its launch, the club remains fully owned and democratically governed by its members, encompassing both men’s and women’s competitive teams that prioritize radical inclusivity over the exclusionary norms common in much of Polish fan culture.
“We set out to build something entirely different: a space where every person, no matter their sexual orientation, race, or nationality, can feel truly welcome and at home,” Jan Dziubecki, AKS Zły’s coordinator, told the Associated Press. Dziubecki noted that fan culture across Poland has shifted sharply further right in recent years, with openly hateful chants and rhetoric becoming a normalized fixture at many top-tier matches.
This political shift has accelerated following the 2024 election of President Karol Nawrocki, a candidate backed by the nationalist conservative Law and Justice party. A lifelong diehard supporter of northern Poland’s Lechia Gdańsk, Nawrocki has continued attending matches regularly since taking office. When reports surfaced during his campaign that he had participated in a violent street brawl between rival football fans, Nawrocki did not deny the incident, instead claiming he had taken part in many “noble” fights throughout his life.
While Nawrocki’s presidency is widely expected to embolden the nationalist, aggressive fan culture that AKS Zły was created to oppose, club leaders say the political shift could paradoxically boost their mission. “Maybe more fans fed up with the current culture will choose to join us,” Dziubecki said with a smile.
Juliusz Wrzosek, one of the club’s founding members and owner of the Offside bar in Warsaw’s working-class Praga district, recalled what pushed him and other like-minded fans to create the alternative club. A lifelong Legia Warszawa fan, Wrzosek was expelled from the club’s radical supporter section after he refused to sing chants honoring fans serving prison sentences. At the same time, his friends who supported rival club Polonia faced marginalization for the same refusal to conform to extremist fan norms. With no mainstream club that aligned with their values, the group decided to build their own. “At the end of the day, you have to support someone,” Wrzosek said.
Today, Wrzosek’s Offside bar serves as both a gathering spot for AKS Zły fans and a community hub for local social and historical events. In March, the club co-hosted a gathering honoring Stefan Okrzeja, a 20th-century socialist worker who fought for Polish independence. Wrzosek emphasized that the gap AKS Zły fills extends far beyond the soccer pitch: “It always bothered me that in Poland, a country with such a rich history of leftist and progressive values, there wasn’t a single democratic club that didn’t force its extreme version of fan culture on everyone.”
That commitment to inclusive norms is visible every match day. During a recent second-division women’s fixture against a higher-ranked side from Słupca, fans in AKS Zły’s small Praga stadium cheered enthusiastically for their team, but also greeted visiting players with warm chants. Criticisms of referee calls were kept polite and minimal, a stark contrast to the confrontational atmosphere common at other Polish matches.
Eliza Górska-Tran, a former AKS Zły player who now supports the team alongside her wife and two young children, said the community built around the club is what sets it apart. After she and her wife married in Scotland — where same-sex marriage is legal, unlike in Poland — AKS Zły fans organized a public wedding celebration for the couple on the stadium pitch. Górska-Tran recalled her final match before pregnancy, when the team marked the occasion with flares, including rainbow-colored smoke, on the field.
“It’s not just empty talk when we say fans are the club’s 12th player. The support here really pushes you to give more,” she said. AKS Zły’s core values extend beyond LGBTQ+ inclusion: the club welcomes immigrant players, invests equally in its men’s and women’s programs, and runs a youth academy where wealthier families voluntarily contribute to cover fees for low-income participants.
Alicja Cichońska, who is currently in her seventh season playing for the club, said she chose to join after hearing about its intentionally inclusive community. “Football is supposed to bring all of us together, not pull us apart,” Cichońska said. “There’s already more than enough division in society as it is.”