3 Roubles Budapest

Part of a Russian commemorative series marking cities liberated by Soviet forces in World War II, the Budapest issue records the siege of February 1945, one of the costliest urban battles of the entire Eastern Front. Soviet and Romanian forces surrounded roughly 33,000 Axis troops in the city; the encirclement lasted nearly two months and left large sections of the Hungarian capital in ruin.

The copper-nickel composition was standard across the entire "liberation cities" subseries, keeping production costs low on issues that saw limited circulation interest domestically.