In the days ahead of the proposed truce, Moscow and Kyiv exchanged a barrage of strikes. Flights at airports across Russia were cancelled and some 60,000 passengers left stranded in the wake of Ukrainian drone attacks. Heavy restrictions are in place in the centre of Moscow as Russia prepares to mark the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany. Russia says 27 world leaders are attending the event, with thousands of troops marching on Red Square ahead of a parade of some of Russia's latest weaponry. Brazil's Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro are among the assembled guests, along with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Robert Fico, Slovakia's prime minister who is the only European Union leader to travel to Moscow. Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky had earlier warned that he could not guarantee the safety of anyone attending the event and has urged heads of state not to travel to Moscow.

Will countries need soldiers and fighter pilots in future conflicts, or will drones do the job? Private companies and governments already own huge databases of our DNA and other biometrics, making it easy for drones equipped with facial recognition to target individuals anywhere. In 2018, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said he survived a drone assassination attempt. And in 2020, Israel assassinated Iran's nuclear programme chief, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, with an autonomous satellite-operated machine gun. Futurist and security consultant Marc Goodman tells host Steve Clemons about the scientific advances that are benefitting humanity – and those that are making the world a darker place.

BOGOTA, Colombia – The exiled opposition leader accused by Venezuelan authorities of directing a failed plot to assassinate President Nicolas Maduro says the greatest threat to the embattled socialist leader may be his detractors in uniform standing quietly behind him. Julio Borges, who once led Venezuela's opposition-controlled National Assembly, said Tuesday that the arrests of two high-ranking military officers in connection with the attack using drones loaded with plastic explosives is yet another signal that fractures within the nation's armed forces are growing. "The conflict today is within the government -- not just at the political level, but more importantly within the armed forces," Borges said in an interview with The Associated Press in Colombia's capital. His comments came hours after Venezuela's chief prosecutor announced the arrest of Gen. Alejandro Perez and Col. Pedro Zambrano from Venezuela's National Guard as part of the investigation into the Aug. 4 attack. Their alleged roles were not described.

Radio jamming systems apparently thwarted an attempted presidential assassination with improvised drone bombs in Venezuela. On Saturday 4th August, President Nicolas Maduro's speech at an outdoor rally was interrupted by two explosions. Seven soldiers on parade were injured, three critically. Others scattered while bodyguards rushed to protect the president with bulletproof shields. Witnesses reported seeing two multicopter drones which crashed into a nearby apartment building and exploded.

CARACAS – Venezuela's all-powerful constituent assembly was to launch proceedings Wednesday to try opposition lawmakers over a failed "attack" on President Nicolas Maduro, who also accused exiled opposition leader Julio Borges over the incident. Constituent Assembly chief Diosdado Cabello called the session to strip the lawmakers of their parliamentary immunity so they could face trial for the alleged and failed bid to kill the president. "When justice comes, it hits hard," Cabello said. Maduro and his government said the president had been targeted by two flying drones each carrying 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds) of powerful C4 plastic explosives. But details of Saturday's incident remain unclear, with conflicting information coming from various sources.

President Nicolas Maduro has accused two opposition legislators of having roles in the drone attack that Venezuelan officials have called an assassination attempt on the leader, and his allies are moving against the accused.

CARACAS, Venezuela – President Nicolas Maduro went on television Tuesday night to accuse one of Venezuela's most prominent opposition leaders of being linked to a weekend assassination attempt using drones. Maduro said statements by several of the six suspects already arrested pointed to involvement by Julio Borges, an opposition leader living in exile in Colombia. "Several of the declarations indicated Julio Borges. The investigations point to him," Maduro said, though he provided no details on Borges' alleged role. Critics of Maduro's socialist government had said immediately following Saturday evening's attack that they feared the unpopular leader would use the incident as an excuse to round up opposition politicians amid widespread unrest over Venezuela's devastating economic collapse.

CARACAS, Venezuela – President Nicolas Maduro has accused two opposition legislators of having roles in the drone attack that Venezuelan officials have called an assassination attempt on the leader, and his allies are moving against the accused. The head of Venezuela's pro-government constitutional assembly said he would have the body take up a proposal Wednesday to strip the lawmakers of their immunity from prosecution. During a national television broadcast Tuesday night, Maduro said statements from some of the six suspects already arrested in the weekend attack pointed to key financiers and others, including Julio Borges, one of the country's most prominent opposition leaders who is a lawmaker but is living in exile in Colombia. "Several of the declarations indicated Julio Borges. The investigations point to him," Maduro said, though he provided no details on Borges' alleged role.

Critics of Maduro's socialist government had said immediately following Saturday evening's attack that they feared the unpopular leader would use the incident as an excuse to round up opposition politicians as he seeks to dampen spreading discontent over Venezuela's devastating economic collapse.

BOGOTA/CARACAS – A former Venezuelan municipal police chief and anti-government activist says he helped organize an operation to launch armed drones over a military rally on Saturday that President Nicolas Maduro has called an assassination attempt. In an interview, Salvatore Lucchese, a Venezuelan activist who was previously imprisoned for his role in past protests, told Reuters he orchestrated the attack with a loose association of anti-Maduro militants known generally in Venezuela as the "resistance." The "resistance" referred to by Lucchese is a diffuse collection of street activists, student organizers and former military officers. It has little formal structure, but is known in the country mostly for organizing protests in recent years in which demonstrators have clashed with police and soldiers. Reuters could not independently verify Lucchese's claims about the attack, in which drones flew over the rally in central Caracas.