Russia expelled a British diplomat from Moscow on March 29, 2026, delivering a formal protest to Britain's Chargé d'affaires and accusing the individual of engaging in economic espionage against the Russian Federation, according to Russia's foreign ministry. The expulsion is the latest in a series of tit-for-tat diplomatic incidents between Moscow and London since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, but it arrives at an unusually sensitive moment — with Russia simultaneously implicated in a separate and more serious intelligence-sharing operation with Iran.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on March 29 that he is "100 percent confident" Russia is actively passing satellite intelligence to Iranian forces. Speaking during a press briefing in Riyadh, Zelenskyy stated that Russian reconnaissance satellites photographed a United States air base in Saudi Arabia on three separate occasions in the days immediately before Iran conducted a strike on that facility. The US Air Force base, which hosts US military assets supporting operations against Iran, was damaged in the attack. American officials have not publicly commented on Zelenskyy's claim, but the allegation — if confirmed — would represent a direct Russian role in enabling Iranian attacks on US forces.
