Elections

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador of Mexico has repeatedly made attacks on members of the news media in a country that is one of the world’s deadliest for journalists.Mexico’s freedom of information institute, a government agency, said Thursday that it would start an investigation into the president’s disclosure on national television of the personal cellphone number of a journalist for The New York Times.The investigation centers on a decision by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador during a televised news conference on Thursday that left many aghast in Mexico, one of the deadliest countries in the world for journalists. At least 128 journalists have been killed in Mexico since 2006, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.During the news conference, Mr. López Obrador read aloud from an email from Natalie Kitroeff, The New York Times’s bureau chief for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. She had requested comment for an article revealing that U.S. law enforcement officials had for years been looking into claims that allies of Mr. López Obrador met with and took millions of dollars from drug cartels.In addition to railing against Ms. Kitroeff and identifying her by name, Mr. López Obrador publicly recited her phone number.“This is tantamount to doxxing, illegal by Mexican privacy laws and places reporters at risk,” Jan-Albert Hootsen, the Mexico representative for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said on X, the social media platform.Mexico’s National Institute of Transparency, Access to Information and Personal Data Protection, or INAI, said in a statement that its investigation would seek to establish whether Mr. López Obrador had violated Mexican legislation protecting personal data. The institute runs Mexico’s freedom of information system, which was created more than two decades ago to make government operations more transparent and curb abuses of power.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Larry Snyder makes his New York Times Crossword debut.Jump to: Tricky CluesFRIDAY PUZZLE — Let’s talk about heteronym clues. They are some of the toughest for solvers to crack because they take advantage of an interesting quirk of the human brain: We sometimes make assumptions about the written word based on our experiences. That’s especially true when we are moving quickly, as some people do when they’re solving a crossword. When we finally solve such a clue by using the crossings, we feel like kicking ourselves for not seeing it sooner.This type of clue is designed to bamboozle you. Not that you asked, but my advice is to not be too hard on yourself if you are fooled. And lean heavily on those crossings.Spoiler alert: I’m going to discuss the heteronym clue in Larry Snyder’s puzzle. If you don’t want it to be spoiled for you, please click the “Tricky Clues” jump link above and you can skip this part.Webster’s New World College Edition defines a heteronym as “a word with the same spelling as another or others, but with different meaning and pronunciation.” For example, “tear” can be a noun that means a drop of water, or a verb that means to rip.Let’s take a look at 2D. I’m going to go out on a limb and bet that those who are just getting into late-week puzzles may have had some trouble with this one. The clue is “Early number?” with a question mark, so we already know that there are shenanigans. The natural assumption is that the clue refers to numerals, and that the word “early” hints at something that happened early in history. Could the answer have something to do with Roman numerals?Congratulations, you’ve just been sent on a wild-goose chase. A solver can make some perfectly reasonable assumptions about this clue and still be wrong because the word “number” is not about numerals at all. The B sound in “number” is pronounced, and the clue is about an early form of anesthesia, or something that numbs. The answer is ETHER.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Instagram does not allow children under 13 to have accounts, but parents are allowed to run them — and many do so for daughters who aspire to be social media influencers.What often starts as a parent’s effort to jump-start a child’s modeling career, or win favors from clothing brands, can quickly descend into a dark underworld dominated by adult men, many of whom openly admit on other platforms to being sexually attracted to children, an investigation by The New York Times found.Thousands of so-called mom-run accounts examined by The Times offer disturbing insights into how social media is reshaping childhood, especially for girls, with direct parental encouragement and involvement.Nearly one in three preteens list influencing as a career goal, and 11 percent of those born in Generation Z, between 1997 and 2012, describe themselves as influencers. But health and technology experts have recently cautioned that social media presents a “profound risk of harm” for girls. Constant comparisons to their peers and face-altering filters are driving negative feelings of self-worth and promoting objectification of their bodies, researchers found.The pursuit of online fame, particularly through Instagram, has supercharged the often toxic phenomenon, The Times found, encouraging parents to commodify their daughter’s images. These are some key findings.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

For the first time in a half-century, an American-built spacecraft has landed on the moon.The robotic lander was the first U.S. vehicle on the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972, the closing chapter in humanity’s astonishing achievement of sending people to the moon and bringing them all back alive. That is a feat that has not been repeated or even tried since.The lander, named Odysseus and a bit bigger than a telephone booth, arrived in the south polar region of the moon at 6:23 p.m. Eastern time on Thursday.The landing time came and went in silence as flight controllers waited to hear confirmation of success. A brief communication pause was expected, but minutes passed.Then Tim Crain, the chief technology officer of Intuitive Machines, the Houston-based company that built Odysseus, reported that a faint signal from the spacecraft had been detected.“It’s faint, but it’s there,” he said. “So stand by, folks. We’ll see what’s happening here.”A short while later, he announced, “What we can confirm, without a doubt, is our equipment is on the surface of the moon and we are transmitting. So congratulations.”Later, he added, “Houston, Odysseus has found its new home.”But with the spacecraft’s ability to properly communicate still unclear, the celebration of clapping and high-fives in the mission control center was muted.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

A package of economic restrictions to be announced on Friday will be the largest since Russia invaded Ukraine two years ago.The United States plans to impose sanctions on more than 500 targets on Friday in its response to Russia over the death of the opposition leader Aleksei A. Navalny, the largest single package in a flurry of economic restrictions since the country’s invasion of Ukraine two years ago, according to a Treasury Department spokeswoman.The new measures, which are set to be rolled out by the Treasury and State Departments on Friday morning, come after the White House signaled this week that it was preparing “major” penalties after the recent death of Mr. Navalny in a Russian prison. It is not clear which sectors or individuals the Biden administration plans to target, a crucial variable in the sanctions’ ultimate expansiveness and effectiveness.As the war approaches its third year, the Biden administration has become increasingly reliant on using its financial tools to try to damage and isolate Russia’s economy. It has worked with allies from the Group of 7 nations to cap the price at which Russian oil can be sold on global markets, frozen hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian central bank assets, and enacted trade restrictions to try to block the flow of technology and equipment that Russia uses to supply its military.The United States has been closely coordinating with Europe in its efforts to cut Russia off from the global economy. This week, the European Union unveiled its 13th tranche of sanctions on Russia, banning nearly 200 people and entities that have been helping Russia procure weapons from traveling or doing business within the bloc. Britain also announced sanctions this week on companies linked to Russia’s ammunition supply chain, as well as on six Russians accused of running the Arctic prison where Mr. Navalny died.Despite the effort to exert economic pressure on Russia, it has largely weathered the restrictions. China, India and Brazil have been buying Russian oil in record quantities, and spending on the war effort has stimulated the Russian economy, which the International Monetary Fund said last month was growing faster than expected. More

Demonstrators marched to the Manhattan headquarters of the lobbying group AIPAC, then to the offices of senators who have accepted donations from the group, where some were arrested.More than a dozen people were arrested Thursday evening during a peaceful pro-Palestinian protest inside a Manhattan building where Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrats of New York, have offices.Wearing black T-shirts reading “Cease Fire Now” and holding up signs demanding that the senators “stop funding genocide,” the protesters linked arms and sat on the floor in front of elevators in the lobby of the building at 780 Third Avenue, singing slogans and ignoring instructions to leave until police officers arrested them.The demonstration, organized by a local chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, a progressive activist group, was the latest in what have become almost daily protests throughout New York City since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7. Those attacks killed at least 1,200 Israelis, according to Israeli officials; Israel’s subsequent military operation in Gaza has killed 29,000 Palestinians, according to Gazan health officials. The mounting death toll and humanitarian crisis in Gaza have prompted international calls for a cease-fire.By about 3:30 p.m. Thursday, several hundred protesters had gathered at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, in front of the United Nations headquarters, where the United States this week cast the lone vote against a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire in the Gaza Strip. It was the third time the Biden administration had blocked similar resolutions, signaling its continued support of Israel.Accompanied by a heavy police presence, the demonstrators on Thursday marched through a light rain toward the headquarters of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a powerful lobbying group established decades ago to promote Israel’s interests in the United States.Organizers blamed senators supported by AIPAC for passing an aid package this month that included $14.1 billion for Israel’s war against Hamas. The bill must still go through the House, where its fate is uncertain.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

More than a century ago, 110 Black soldiers were convicted of murder, mutiny and other crimes at three military trials held at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. Nineteen were hanged, including 13 on a single day, Dec. 11, 1917, in the largest mass execution of American soldiers by the Army.The soldiers’ families spent decades fighting to show that the men had been betrayed by the military. In November, they won a measure of justice when the Army secretary, Christine E. Wormuth, overturned the convictions and acknowledged that the soldiers “were wrongly treated because of their race and were not given fair trials.”On Thursday, several descendants of the soldiers gathered at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery as the Department of Veterans Affairs dedicated new headstones for 17 of the executed servicemen.Just before he was executed, Private Hawkins wrote a letter to his parents, telling them: “Although I am not guilty of the crime that I’m accused of Mother, it’s God’s will that I go now and in this way.”Michael A. McCoy for The New York TimesThe new headstones acknowledge each soldier’s rank, unit and home state — a simple honor accorded to every other veteran buried in the cemetery. They replaced the previous headstones that noted only their name and date of death.(The families of the other two who were hanged reclaimed their remains for private burial.)The headstones were unveiled after an honor guard fired a three-volley rifle salute, a bugler played “Taps” and officials presented the descendants with folded American flags and certificates declaring that the executed soldiers had been honorably discharged.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Strikes overnight killed nearly 100, seven of them in Rafah, as officials said there had been momentum on a deal to free some Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.Intense bombardment of a Gaza Strip city filled with refugees flattened a large mosque and killed or wounded scores of people on Thursday as Israel repeated its intention to push into the area with ground forces if Hamas does not release hostages before the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.Nearly 100 people were killed across the enclave from Israeli strikes over the past day, the Gazan health authorities said Thursday, bringing the total death toll after almost 20 weeks of war to nearly 30,000.Around half of the Gaza Strip’s population of 2.3 million people are crammed into the southern city of Rafah along the border with Egypt, where the strike on the mosque occurred Thursday. Wafa, the Palestinian news agency, reported that at least seven Palestinians had been killed overnight in Rafah and dozens more wounded.Israel’s preparations for an invasion of that area come as diplomats raced to forestall it, with Ramadan set to begin around March 10.President Biden’s Middle East coordinator, Brett McGurk, met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday for “a good couple of hours,” focusing on whether negotiators could “cement a hostage deal” according to a White House spokesman. Talks last week in Cairo for a hostage deal failed when Mr. Netanyahu withdrew his negotiators, accusing Hamas of refusing to budge on what he called “ludicrous” demands and pledging to press on with Israel’s offensive.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More