Queen tells kids studying space of meeting Soviet cosmonaut

LONDON (AP) — Queen Elizabeth II has reminded a group of schoolchildren studying space exploration about the importance of returning to Earth as she reminisced in a video call about the first man to make the trip — Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. The monarch, who invited Gargarin to lunch at Buckingham Palace shortly after his historic flight in 1961, was asked what the pioneering spaceman was like. “Russian,’’ she replied with a smile as her audience chuckled. The call with students from Thomas Jones Primary School in west London came during a difficult week for the queen, after the royal family was rocked by charges of racism and insensitivity leveled at them by Prince Harry and Meghan.  But despite the controversy, the queen went ahead with her work.