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Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Tuesday.


1. The U.S. and its allies moved swiftly to impose economic hardship on Russia for what President Biden called “the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine.”
Biden condemned President Vladimir Putin’s actions, saying Russia’s movement into two regions in Ukraine yesterday was “a flagrant violation of international law.”


Biden said that the U.S. would “cut off Russia’s government from Western finance” by blocking two Russian financial institutions and sanctioning Russian debt. Russia’s elites will also face sanctions. But he held off on more far-reaching and punishing sanctions.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken canceled a planned meeting with his Russian counterpart, but said that the U.S. would continue to pursue diplomacy.
European leaders also imposed an initial raft of sanctions, but they kept bigger penalties in reserve. Germany halted the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, a major project in partnership with Russia.
This may seem like a rekindling of the Cold War, but in a world where American power is no longer absolute and the Russian-Chinese alignment is strong, the stakes are entirely different, our Paris bureau chief writes in a news analysis.


2. The three white men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery were found guilty of hate crimes.
Jurors said they pursued and killed Arbery because he was Black. The jury also found the men — Travis McMichael, 36, his father, Gregory McMichael, 66, and their neighbor William Bryan, 52 — guilty of attempted kidnapping and found the McMichaels guilty of one count each of brandishing or discharging a firearm during a violent crime. They now face up to life in prison on top of the life sentences for Arbery’s murder.
National civil rights leaders hailed the conviction as a victory for racial justice. But they also said it reflected the determination of Arbery’s mother, who had vowed to keep fighting for her son and pleaded with the judge not to accept plea deals.


3. Hong Kong will require its more than seven million residents to undergo coronavirus testing in March as it struggles to contain its worst outbreak.


Residents will have to take three tests over a short period and Hong Kong will expand its testing capacity by next month to one million tests a day from about 200,000 a day, Carrie Lam, the territory’s chief executive said. Many students’ summer breaks will also start early to lessen crowding and so their schools can be used as testing, isolation and vaccination facilities.
In Britain, Queen Elizabeth canceled all virtual engagements today as her mild Covid symptoms persist. We also spoke to immunocompromised and higher-risk people who are feeling highly vulnerable after the remaining virus restrictions were lifted in England.


4. U.S. Soccer and a group of women’s players agreed to settle a six-year equal pay lawsuit.
Under the terms of the agreement, several dozen athletes will share $24 million in payments from U.S. Soccer. The bulk of that figure is back pay, a tacit admission that compensation for the men’s and women’s teams had been unequal for years. U.S. Soccer also pledged to equalize pay between the men’s and women’s national teams in all competitions, including the World Cup, in the teams’ next collective bargaining agreements.
The change could funnel millions of dollars to a new generation of women’s players.
The agreement ends a contentious dispute that pitted key members of the U.S. women’s soccer team against their sport’s national governing body.


5. The Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal from a web designer who objects to providing wedding-related services for same-sex marriages.
The case may reconcile claims of religious liberty with laws banning discrimination based on sexual orientation. A decision by the court in a similar dispute in 2018 sided with a Colorado baker who refused to create a wedding cake for a gay couple, but it left open the larger question of whether a business may discriminate against gay people based on rights protected by the First Amendment.
From a Times Magazine investigation: Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, Ginni Thomas, battled for years for a more conservative America. In the effort to overturn the 2020 election, the lines between their interests became blurred. New reporting shows how far she was willing to go.


6. Amid a spike in terror attacks in recent months, Pakistan is facing a tough decision: how much to help the new Taliban government in Afghanistan while contending with increasing risks to its own citizens.


The group’s rule in Kabul has emboldened the Pakistani Taliban, which have extorted traders and senior government officials with threats, and killed scores of police officers. But Pakistani officials stress that a stable Afghanistan is essential for a stable Pakistan.
Pakistan witnessed a 42 percent increase in terrorist attacks in 2021 compared with the previous year, according to one figure.


7. The Congo Basin is home to one of the planet’s greatest natural resources — as long as it remains undisturbed.


The swamps in Lokolama, a village in the Democratic Republic of Congo, are part of the biggest network of tropical peatlands in the world, covering over 55,000 square miles of Central Africa. In those peatlands are stored more than 30 billion tons of carbon, the equivalent of 20 years of U.S. fossil fuel emissions.
Roads could be built giving loggers better access to the forest. Politicians could decide to convert peatland into farms. In these scenarios, the peat would dry out and release carbon into the atmosphere and, the researchers warned, become not only endangered but dangerous. Now the peatland’s guardians are asking what they’re owed for keeping it intact.


8. The latest diet craze is fueling a huge pet-wellness industry.
Pet owners are increasingly devoting considerable thought and money to what their dogs, cats, hamsters, goldfish and other domesticated animals eat. Owners are putting animals on human regimens — gluten-free, raw-food, grain-free, vegan and vegetarian — and giving them CBD, probiotic or vitamin C supplements. But fad diets can pose the same hazards for pets as they can for humans, experts warn.
In her final column on personal health in The Times, Jane Brody writes about how health advice has changed since she joined The Times in 1965. Here’s how recommendations on dieting, smoking, surgery, sexuality and mental health have changed.


9. Sandra Oh and Jodie Comer are laying “Killing Eve” to rest.
Audiences won’t find out if the former MI6 agent Eve (played by Oh) and the globetrotting assassin Villanelle (Comer) are fated to wind up like Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers until the series finale of “Killing Eve” airs this spring. Across four seasons, the bodies mounted as their characters’ mutual obsession deepened.
“I think we stayed true to the characters and to each other,” Oh said in a conversation with Comer.
In “The Gilded Age,” the HBO period drama sets invented melodrama within actual historical story lines. Here are the back stories of elements that shape the world of the series.


10. And finally, a sky ablaze with stars.
It isn’t as easy as it once was to find a dazzling night sky. Because of light pollution, about 83 percent of the world’s population can’t see a naturally dark sky, according to one study. To catch the best view of celestial objects, many head to Dark Sky designated areas where lighting is limited and stargazing is optimized.
Our writer headed to Utah, which has the densest concentration of designated Dark Sky places in the world. She planned her trip as close as she could to the new moon, when the sky is darkest, and for the fall, when cooler temperatures bring better air clarity. The result: “It was one of the most heart-stoppingly beautiful things I’d ever seen.”

Source: New York Times

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