Russian forces escalated attacks on Ukrainian cities.
Good evening. This is your Russia-Ukraine War Briefing, a guide to the latest news and analysis about the conflict.
-
Russian forces carried out attacks in Ukraine’s two biggest cities, targeting civilian areas.
-
About 660,000 people have fled Ukraine in the past six days, the U.N. refugee agency said.
-
President Biden will discuss Russia’s war in Ukraine in his State of the Union address this evening.
-
Oil prices soared to well over $100 a barrel, prompting countries to dip into their emergency reserves.
-
These maps show how Russian troops are pushing into Ukraine. Here’s a look at what’s behind the crisis.
-
Follow our live updates.
Civilians under attack
Russian forces targeted Ukrainian cities with increasingly powerful weapons on the sixth day of Moscow’s invasion, inflicting a heavy toll on civilians.
In Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, an apparent rocket strike devastated a large administrative building in the main square, killing seven people, according to Ukrainian officials.
In the capital, Kyiv, the main TV tower was struck after a Russian Defense Ministry warning to civilians to evacuate. Moscow said it was engaged in “high-precision” strikes to “prevent information attacks against Russia.”
Russian forces were also targeting the southern city of Kherson, where videos on social media showed an attack on apartment buildings. In Mariupol, a crucial port city in the east, residents were without electricity and heat after intense fighting. Capturing Mariupol would allow Russian forces in the south to join with Russian-backed separatists in the east, isolating Ukrainian troops in the region.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, accused Russia of war crimes for targeting civilians, as many of the 2.8 million residents in Kyiv huddled in bomb shelters overnight.
North of the capital, a convoy of Russian tanks and vehicles stretching for 40 miles raised the possibility that Moscow could try an encirclement of the capital.
But the advance has not gone smoothly. Plagued by poor morale as well as fuel and food shortages, some Russian troops in Ukraine have surrendered en masse or sabotaged their own vehicles to avoid fighting, a senior Pentagon official said.
These factors may help explain why the convoy of tanks and armored vehicles near Kyiv has slowed to a near crawl in the past day or two, even as an estimated 80 percent of the more than 150,000 Russian troops amassed on Ukraine’s borders have now joined the fight.
Microsoft enters the war
Just before Russian tanks began rolling into Ukraine on Wednesday, alarms went off inside the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center, warning of a never-before-seen piece of “wiper” malware that appeared aimed at Ukraine’s government ministries and financial institutions.
Microsoft quickly picked apart the malware and notified Ukraine’s top cyberdefense authority, throwing itself into the middle of the war in Europe. After conferring with the Biden administration, the company shared details of the code with other European nations, out of fear that the malware would spread, potentially crippling NATO or hitting European banks.
After years of discussions in Washington and in tech circles about the need for public-private partnerships to combat destructive cyberattacks, the war in Ukraine is stress-testing the system.
Russia-Ukraine War: Key Things to Know
Civilians under fire. Russian forces targeted Ukrainian cities with increasingly powerful weapons on the sixth day of the invasion, inflicting a heavy toll on civilians. Explosions shook Kyiv and Kharkiv, while Russian troops moved to capture Mariupol in the south, a critical port city.
Microsoft is not the only tech company thrust into the fight. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, disclosed on Sunday that it had discovered hackers taking over accounts belonging to Ukrainian military officials and public figures to spread disinformation. Meta responded by locking down the accounts and alerting users who had been targeted.
Ukraine’s vice prime minister also said today that Elon Musk’s company, SpaceX, had sent terminals that connect to thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbit, which provide high-speed internet access. Those could be a crucial link to the outside world if Russia successfully attacks Ukraine’s internet infrastructure.
Russia has a reputation as one of the most aggressive and skilled practitioners of cyber attacks, but the surprise of recent days is that Russia’s activity on the cyber front has been more muted than expected, researchers said.
U.S. officials say a massive cyberattack by Russia in retaliation for sanctions is hardly off the table. Some speculate that just as Moscow steps up its bombing, it will seek to cause as much economic disruption as it can muster.
Related: Liveuamap, a popular mapping tool that journalists, open source researchers and relief organizations use to track developments in Ukraine, has been under a sustained distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack.
What else we’re following
Analysis
-
Italy, which has some of Europe’s closest ties to Russia, is enacting robust sanctions to weaken President Vladimir Putin, even at a potentially outsize cost for Italians.
-
In Turkey, there is a sense of anger in President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s circle that Putin lied about his intentions in Ukraine, increasing frictions between the leaders.
-
The invasion has rekindled debates in Taiwan about the probability of a Chinese invasion, the level of Taiwan’s military preparedness and whether the U.S. is committed to defending the island.
-
The Russian invasion and Western sanctions have injected a huge dose of uncertainty and volatility into decision-making, heightening the risk to the global economic outlook.
-
From Opinion: Russia is even weaker than most people seem to have realized, Paul Krugman writes. Putin may well take Kyiv, but he will have made himself weaker, not stronger.
Other developments
-
The U.N. appealed for $1.7 billion in aid to help refugees and other victims of Russia’s invasion. “The crisis has turned very ugly, very fast,” Martin Griffiths, the U.N. emergency aid coordinator, said.
-
The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said yesterday that he would investigate allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
-
Many Ukrainians and Russians have relatives who are standing on opposite sides of the conflict, prompting fears that they could harm each other in battle.
-
Cryptocurrency investors have donated more than $22 million to the Ukrainian government and a nonprofit organization supporting the country’s military, according to data provided by the blockchain tracking firm Elliptic.
Protests and reactions
-
TotalEnergies, a French oil company with large natural gas investments in Russia, said that it would no longer provide capital for new projects there.
-
The organizations that oversee professional tennis will prohibit Russia and Belarus from competing in team events but will allow players from those countries on the courts. Daniil Medvedev, the top-ranked men’s tennis player, will take part in tournaments as a neutral player with no national identification.
-
About 100 diplomats walked out of a speech by Russia’s foreign minister at the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken questioned whether Russia should lose its seat on the rights council.
-
The French actor Gérard Depardieu, who has close ties to Putin, has denounced the war.
-
The Russian maestro Valery Gergiev, a prominent Putin supporter, was removed from his post as chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic after he refused to denounce Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
-
Putin has been stripped of his honorary taekwondo black belt, Reuters reported.
We also recommend:
-
Today’s episode of “The Daily” tells the story of three men facing the call to fight in Ukraine.
Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Carole
Sign up here to get the briefing by email.
What did you like? What do you want to see here? Email your thoughts to briefing@nytimes.com.
"come" - Google News
March 02, 2022 at 06:49AM
https://ift.tt/paeSyHL
Civilians Come Under Fire - The New York Times
"come" - Google News
https://ift.tt/KL2q0dc
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Civilians Come Under Fire - The New York Times"
Post a Comment