Russian Invasion of Ukraine (2022)

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      Putin Wants Fealty, and He’s Found It in Africa

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      BANGUI, Central African Republic — In early March, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine entered its third week, a Russian diplomat nearly 3,000 miles away in the Central African Republic paid an unusual visit to the head of this country’s top court. His message was blunt: The country’s pro-Kremlin president must remain in office, indefinitely.To do this, the diplomat, Yevgeny Migunov, the second secretary at the Russian Embassy, argued that the court should abolish the constitutional restriction limiting a president to two terms. He insisted that President Faustin-Archange Touadéra, who is in his second term and surrounds himself with Russian mercenaries, should stay on, for the good of the country.“I was absolutely astonished,” recalled Danièle Darlan, 70, then the court’s president, describing for the first time the meeting on March 7. “I warned them that our instability stemmed from presidents wanting to make their rule eternal.”The Russian was unmoved. Seven months later, in October, Ms. Darlan was ousted by presidential decree in order to open the way for a referendum to rewrite the Constitution, only adopted in 2016, and abolish term limits. This would effectively cement what one Western ambassador called the Central African Republic’s status as a “vassal state” of the Kremlin.With his invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia unleashed a new disorder on the world. Ukraine has portrayed its fight against becoming another Russian vassal as one for universal freedom, and the cause has resonated in the United States and Europe. But in the Central African Republic, Russia already has its way, with scant Western reaction, and in the flyblown mayhem of its capital, Bangui, a different kind of Russian victory is already on display.Russian mercenaries with the same shadowy Wagner Group now fighting in Ukraine bestride the Central African Republic, a country rich in gold and diamonds. Their impunity appears total as they move in unmarked vehicles, balaclavas covering half their faces and openly carrying automatic rifles. The large mining and timber interests that Wagner now controls are reason enough to explain why Russia wants no threat to a compliant government.From Bangui itself, where Wagner forces steal and threaten, to Bria in the center of the country, to Mbaiki in the south, I saw Moscow’s mercenaries everywhere during a two-and-a-half-week stay, despite pressure on them to rotate to fight in Ukraine.“They threaten stability, they undermine good governance, they rob countries of mineral wealth, they violate human rights,” Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said of Wagner operatives last week during a U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington.Yet, although feared, the Russians are often welcomed as a more effective presence in keeping a fragile peace than the more than 14,500 blue-helmeted United Nations peacekeepers in this war-torn country since 2014. As elsewhere in the developing world, the West has seemingly lost hearts and minds here. President Biden’s framework for this era — the battle between democracy and rising autocracy — comes across as too binary for a time of complex challenges. Despite the war in Ukraine, even because of it, Central Africans are intensely skeptical of lessons on Western “values.”Mr. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and the inflationary spiral it has spawned has made a desperate situation more desperate in this landlocked nation. Prices for staples like cooking oil are up by 50 percent or more. Gasoline is now sold in smuggled canisters or bottles, as gas stations have none. Hunger is more widespread, in part because U.N. agencies sometimes lack the fuel to deliver food.Yet many Central Africans do not blame Russia.President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has made a desperate situation more desperate, yet many Central Africans do not blame Russia.Russian mercenaries shopping in October at Bangui Mall, a fancy supermarket used mostly by embassies’ staff and nongovernmental organizations based in the country.A Russian Orthodox Church in Bangui.Tired of Western hypocrisy and empty promises, stung by the shrug that war in Africa elicits in Western capitals as compared with war in Ukraine, many people I met were inclined to support Mr. Putin over their former colonizers in Paris. If Russian brutality in Bucha or Mariupol appalls the West, Russian brutality in the Central African Republic is widely perceived to have helped quiet a decade-old conflict.Africa will account for a quarter of humanity by 2050. China spreads its influence through huge investments, construction and loans. Mr. Biden convened the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit “to build on our shared values” and announced $15 billion in new business deals, as the West scrambles to play catch-up and overcome a legacy of colonialism.Mr. Putin’s Russia, by contrast, never builds a bridge, but is the master of pitiless protection services, plunder and propaganda. It wins friends through hard power, now extended to more than a dozen African countries, including Mali and Sudan. As in Syria, its readiness to use force secures the outcome it seeks.In March, only 28 of Africa’s 54 countries voted at the United Nations to condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the same slim majority that subsequently voted to condemn Russia’s annexation of four Ukrainian regions, suggesting a growing reluctance to accept an American narrative of right and wrong.“When your house is burning, you don’t mind the color of the water you use to put out the fire,” said Honoré Bendoit, the subprefect of Bria, a regional capital, about 280 miles (or a six-day drive on what passes for roads here) northeast of Bangui. “We have calm thanks to the Russians. They are violent and they are efficient.” More

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      Your Friday Briefing: A Times Investigation Into Bucha

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      Also, Benjamin Netanyahu is poised to lead Israel again and the week in culture.Russian paratroopers entered Bucha to gain control of a major route toward Kyiv.The Russians who killed in BuchaAn eight-month investigation by The Times has identified the Russian military unit behind one of the worst atrocities of the war in Ukraine: the killing of dozens of civilians in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha.A team of reporters spent months in Bucha after Russian forces withdrew in late March, interviewing residents, collecting security-camera footage and obtaining records from government sources. In New York, the reporters analyzed the materials and reconstructed the killings along one street.The Times concluded that the perpetrators of a massacre along Yablunska Street were Russian paratroopers from the 234th Air Assault Regiment, based in the city of Pskov in western Russia and led by Lt. Col. Artyom Gorodilov.The evidence shows that the killings were intentional. Russian troops apparently killed the people as part of a ruthless “clearing” operation to secure a route leading to Kyiv. Some of the most damning evidence implicating the 234th Regiment included phone records and decoded call signs used by commanders on Russian radio channels.The Visual Investigations team identified 36 Ukrainian victims and retraced their final moments. For weeks, their bodies lay along Yablunska Street.These are some of the people killed in Bucha.The New York TimesMore on UkrainePresident Volodymyr Zelensky headed back to Kyiv after receiving a hero’s welcome in Washington.Zelensky’s address to Congress revealed hints about his worries for the year ahead, David Sanger writes in an analysis.The U.S. Senate passed a $1.7 trillion spending bill, which includes nearly $50 billion in assistance to Ukraine.Bakhmut has been under fierce Russian attack for months. But through it all, one snack stand remained open.Benjamin Netanyahu announced the coalition deal just minutes before a midnight deadline on Wednesday night.Maya Alleruzzo/Associated PressNetanyahu’s new hard-line coalitionIsrael’s Parliament is expected to ratify in the coming days a coalition deal that will return Benjamin Netanyahu to office just 18 months after he left. Netanyahu will lead a hard-line six-party coalition, the most right-wing administration in Israeli history.Netanyahu’s deals to cement the support of far-right coalition partners are raising widespread concerns about Israel’s future as a liberal democracy. Already, the coalition is pushing legislation that could upset the balance of powers between the government, the police and the judiciary.Understand the Situation in ChinaThe Communist Party cast aside restrictive “zero Covid” policy, which set off mass protests that were a rare challenge to the Communist leadership.Medicine Shortages: As Covid rips through parts of China, millions are struggling to find treatment — from the most basic cold remedies to take at home to more powerful antivirals for patients in hospitals.Traumatized and Deflated: Gripped with grief and anxiety, many in China want a national reckoning over the hard-line Covid policy. Holding the government accountable may be a quixotic quest.A Cloudy Picture: Despite Beijing’s assurances that the situation is under control, data on infections has become more opaque amid loosened pandemic constraints.In Beijing: As Covid sweeps across the Chinese capital, Beijing looks like a city in the throes of a lockdown — this time, self-imposed by residents.The country is also preparing for a constitutional showdown. Netanyahu is on trial for corruption. He denies any intention to influence the case. But some coalition members seek to legalize some crimes of which he is accused and to restrict the authority of the attorney general, who is overseeing his prosecution.Details: Future ministers include several far-right Jewish settlers who have a history of homophobia, antagonism toward Israel’s Arab minority and opposition to secular aspects of public life. One, Itamar Ben-Gvir, was barred from serving in the Israeli Army because he was considered too extremist.Looking ahead: The right-wing block would be Israel’s first ideologically cohesive government since 2019, but analysts say that will not necessarily provide political stability. Members frequently disagree over policy and took more than six weeks to formalize their partnership.This testing booth in Beijing was shut down after China ended its “zero Covid” policy.Gilles Sabrié for The New York TimesChina’s censors in a tailspinSince China dropped its “zero Covid” policy, the country’s hundreds of thousands of internet censors don’t know how they are supposed to adapt or explain the abrupt policy shift.Many frustrated and confused Chinese are openly asking why they put up with years of restrictions, only for China’s leadership to abandon the policies and allow the virus to spread unabated. For now, the propagandists are trying to emphasize social stability.Cases: The W.H.O. says China is probably widely undercounting its Covid-19 cases, Reuters reports. This week, health authorities said that only deaths caused by coronavirus-induced pneumonia and respiratory failure would be attributed to Covid.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificThe police believed that Charles Sobhraj killed as many as 20 people, though he was convicted in only three killings.Prakash Mathema/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesA court in Nepal ordered the release from prison of a 78-year-old French serial killer who targeted Western tourists in Asia in the 1970s and ’80s.Russia and China held joint naval drills in the East China Sea yesterday, The Associated Press reports, a day after Xi Jinping met in Beijing with Dmitri Medvedev, the former Russian leader and close ally of Vladimir Putin.U.S. NewsSam Bankman-Fried will be released on $250 million bail. Two top executives of his crypto empire have pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.Much of the middle of the U.S. is bracing for a brutal mix of cold, blowing snow and high winds set to arrive during peak Christmas-season travel.Elon Musk has reinstated thousands of suspended Twitter users. They’re back to posting Covid skepticism and election denial.The Week in CultureAmber Heard has agreed to pay $1 million to end the case.Associated PressAmber Heard decided to settle a defamation case involving her ex-husband, Johnny Depp.Dolly Parton’s theme park has transformed, over three decades, into a major Christmas attraction.Philip Pearlstein, an artist famous for his coolly observed nudes, died at 98.The archaeological park of Pompeii keeps vegetation overgrowth at bay with a low-tech solution: hungry sheep.A Morning Read“It’s worse than Covid, worse than energy costs,” a restaurant owner said of the labor shortage.Mary Turner for The New York TimesLondon restaurants used to recruit many waiters, chefs and bartenders from Italy, Spain and Greece. Now, after Brexit closed doors to migrants, eateries are desperately short on staff.About 40 percent of restaurants have curtailed their hours, and more than a third of restaurants, pubs and hotels could face insolvency or even closure by early 2023, according to a recent survey.Lives lived: Xi Xi wrote with playful humor and poignancy about life at the margins of Hong Kong. She died at 85.ARTS AND IDEAS“Panettone isn’t a recipe; it’s a lifestyle,” said Giuseppe Piffaretti, who founded an international panettone competition.Camilla Ferrari for The New York TimesThe fight over PanettonePanettone was long a symbol of Christmas in Italy, where the domed sweet bread, scented with spices and dotted with fruit, was wrapped and given as a gift.In the past decade, it has — much like pizza — burst past its Italian borders and gained a global profile. Panettone baking competitions have sprung up in Singapore and Japan, where one version is leavened with sake lees. Italians win most of the titles, and culinary schools and hotel chains have begun flying the winners to teach workshops in Kuala Lumpur and Mumbai.But the international fanfare is causing hand-wringing among Italian bakers, who are determined to show that the original panettone is still No. 1. Best-of lists and awards have proliferated: “This is a world championship, not a church bake sale,” the founder of one contest said.We have tips to help you pick the perfect panettone.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookKelly Marshall for The New York TimesThis brown stew with pork shoulder is spiced and pungent.What to WatchLoosely based on real-life events in an ultraconservative Mennonite colony in Bolivia, “Women Talking” depicts women debating their faith after a series of sexual assaults.What to ReadIn “Blaze Me a Sun,” murders and disappearances pile up in a small Swedish town.What to Listen toAn Indian American family celebrates Christmas with Bollywood music. Here’s their playlist.TravelLondon is too big to see in just a weekend. But you could try.Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and here’s a clue: Old flames (four letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. If you’re celebrating Christmas, I hope you have a lovely holiday. — AmeliaP.S. Rory Smith, our chief soccer correspondent, hoped for an unsurprising World Cup final. This one was harder to cover, but way more fun.“The Daily” is about the political crisis in Peru.You can always reach us at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Broad, Sunlit Uplands

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      On June 18, 1940, Churchill delivered his celebrated “Finest Hour” speech. The British Army had been evacuated from Dunkirk. France, under Pétain, had decided to surrender. “Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this island or lose the war,” Churchill told the House of Commons.“If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science.”Two of those phrases — “broad, sunlit uplands” and “the abyss of a new Dark Age” — should ring in our ears as we approach the end of this hinge year in history.Broad, sunlit uplands are the women of Iran tearing off their hijabs the way the people of Berlin once tore down their wall. And Ukrainian soldiers raising their flag over Irpin, Lyman, Kherson and other cities liberated from Russian barbarism. And Chinese protesters demanding — and gaining — an end to their regime’s cruel and crazy Covid lockdowns by holding up blank sheets of paper, where nothing needed to be written because everyone already knew what they meant.Broad, sunlit uplands were Emmanuel Macron’s victories over the fascistic Marine Le Pen in France. They were the defeat of nearly every election denier in the United States who ran to oversee voting at the state level. They were the drubbing of most of Donald Trump’s handpicked candidates in battleground midterm elections, including in states such as Georgia where non-QAnon Republicans won handily.Broad, sunlit uplands are a Covid fatality rate that, in America, no longer spikes a few weeks after case counts do. They are the demonstration that a lab-made fusion reaction can create more energy than it consumes. They are the lofting of a telescope that lets us peer far into the reaches of space and back to the beginning of time.This isn’t just a laundry list of the year’s good news. It is a demonstration of the capacity of people across cultures and circumstances to demand, defend and define freedom; to defy those who would deny it; and to use freedom to broaden the boundaries of what we can know and do and imagine.But it isn’t the only thing 2022 demonstrated. We continue to stare into the abyss of a new Dark Age, brought about not just by the malice of the enemies of freedom but also by the complacency and wishful thinking of its advocates.The complacent include those who imagined we could leave Afghanistan to the Taliban and suffer no wider consequences. But the perception of American weakness travels fast and far. Vladimir Putin’s second invasion of Ukraine, on Feb. 24, happened about six months after that American fiasco. Recall that his first invasion of Ukraine, in February 2014, happened a few months after Barack Obama’s Syria debacle over his chemical weapons “red line.”The complacent include those who thought that we could trade our way to a form of perpetual peace — whether by bringing China into the World Trade Organization or outsourcing Europe’s energy needs to Putin or imagining we could strengthen Iranian “moderates” with sanctions relief. Dictatorships are rarely weakened by being enriched. Lenin may not have said that “capitalists will sell us the rope with which to hang them,” but it’s remarkable how the point never seems to be learned by successive generations of capitalists.The complacent include those supposedly sophisticated Republicans who never took a real stand against Trump — first on the grounds that he couldn’t win; then on the view that he could be a vehicle for conservative policy victories; then in the conviction that he would concede gracefully; then in the belief that impeachment after Jan. 6 was too extreme a remedy — only to see him infest the party with conspiracy theorists and lead it to its well-earned defeat.The complacent are those who think that no vital American interest is at stake in a Ukrainian victory or in the outcome of the Iranian demonstrations. Or that China’s recent travails, along with Russia’s setbacks in Ukraine, might dissuade Xi Jinping from trying to seize Taiwan. Or that a corner has been turned on inflation. Or that the surging wave of migration across the southern border, sparked by a collapse in governance throughout much of Latin America, is some peculiar right-wing obsession rather than a genuine crisis that will incite a furious populist backlash if it isn’t competently managed.As Britain was fighting for its life in 1940, much of America was still uncertain as to what, if anything, the moment demanded of it. Churchill laid out the choice: sunlit uplands, or the abyss. It remains our choice today.Happy holidays.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      What’s In (and Not In) the $1.7 Trillion Spending Bill

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      A big boost for the military, more aid for Ukraine, a preference for the lobster industry over whales and an overhaul of the Electoral Count Act are among the provisions in the 4,155-page bill lawmakers expect to pass this week.WASHINGTON — Billions of dollars in emergency aid to war-torn Ukraine and communities ravaged by natural disasters. A bipartisan proposal to overhaul the archaic law at the heart of former President Donald J. Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election. And a divisive oceanic policy that will change federal protections for whales in an effort to protect the lobster industry in Maine.In compiling the roughly $1.7 trillion catchall spending package that will keep the government open through September, lawmakers inserted several new funding and legislative proposals to ensure their priorities and policies become law before the end of the year.It includes funding that will guarantee the enactment of policies first authorized in bipartisan legislation approved earlier in this Congress, including money for innovation hubs established in the semiconductor manufacturing law and projects in the infrastructure law. The package also includes a round of earmarks, rebranded as community project funding, that allow lawmakers to redirect funds to specific projects in their states and districts.Here is a look at some of the provisions that would go into effect if enacted.Military spending is the big winner.The Defense Department would see an extraordinary surge in spending when adding its regular 2023 fiscal year budget together with additional funds being allocated to help respond to the war in Ukraine.All together, half of the $1.7 trillion in funding included in the package goes to defense, or a total of $858 billion. It comes after lawmakers bucked a request from President Biden and approved a substantial increase in the annual defense policy bill passed this month.The 2023 budget just for the Defense Department would total $797.6 billion in discretionary spending — a 10 percent increase over last year’s budget — representing an extra $69.3 billion in funds for the Pentagon, which is $36.1 billion above the president’s budget request.Sprinkled throughout the spending bill are hundreds of high-ticket add-ons that Congress wants to make to the president’s original Defense Department budget, such as an additional $17.2 billion for procurement that the Pentagon can largely distribute to military contractors to buy new ships, airplanes, missile systems and other equipment. The overall Pentagon procurement budget with these additional funds would be $162 billion.One of the biggest chunks of that extra money is for shipbuilding — an extra $4 billion that brings the Navy’s overall shipbuilding budget to $31.96 billion. That will allow it to buy 11 new ships, including three guided missile destroyers and two attack submarines.But that is just the start. There is $8.5 billion to buy 61 F-35 fighter jets made by Lockheed Martin and another $2.5 billion to buy 15 of Boeing’s new aerial refueling planes known as KC-46 tankers.There is also an extra $27.9 billion to help cover Defense Department costs associated with the war in Ukraine, as part of an emergency aid package to the country. That includes an extra $11.88 billion to replenish U.S. stocks of equipment sent to Ukraine — money that again will largely be used to purchase products from military contractors. That supplemental appropriation also includes $9 billion to assist Ukraine with training, equipment and weapons, as well as an extra $6.98 billion to cover U.S. military operations in Europe.— Eric Lipton and John IsmayMaking it easier (for some) to save for retirement.The package also includes a collection of new rules aimed at helping Americans save for retirement. The bill would require employers to automatically enroll eligible employees in their 401(k) and 403(b) plans, setting aside at least 3 percent, but no more than 10 percent, of their paychecks. Contributions would be increased by one percentage point each year thereafter, until it reaches at least 10 percent (but not more than 15 percent). But this applies only to new employer-provided plans that are started in 2025 and later — existing plans are exempt.Another provision would help lower- and middle-income earners saving for retirement by making changes to an existing tax credit, called the saver’s credit, now available only to those who owe taxes. In its new form, it would amount to a matching contribution, from the federal government, deposited into taxpayers’ retirement accounts.People struggling with student debt would also receive a new perk: Employees making student debt payments would qualify for employer matching contributions in their workplace retirement plan, even if they were not making plan contributions of their own.What to Know About Congress’s Lame-Duck SessionCard 1 of 5A productive stretch. More

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      Was the World Collapsing? Or Were You Just Freaking Out?

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      What should we make of this year in America? There’s an argument that this is the end, or the beginning of the end, that the infrastructure of our democracy is crumbling, and that the jittery quality in the economy portends collapse and that the nuclear risk in Russia’s war in Ukraine could combust into something much bigger. There is, then, the counterargument that even with all these strains, we’re actually witnessing the system hold, that democracy prevails, that the danger is fading.Those arguments can register as hysterical or dismissive or out of touch, but they can also be considered in the most openhearted, late-night kind of way. Maybe we really are on the verge of something even worse, as in large stretches of the 20th century, and this is how people felt in previous eras that you read about. Is the world as we knew it ending? Would you even know, until it was too late, until it was actually over?In 2022, you could find the swings in discourse between apocalypse and dismissal, panic and caution, in politics, in the media, on Twitter and Instagram, over text, in person, within and between ideological factions, about war in Europe, about the state of American democracy, about illiberalism and the prospective retreat from globalism, about violence, about Covid, about artificial intelligence, about inflation and energy prices and crypto collapse contagion. There are deep versions of this debate, and reductive ones you catch a glimpse of in Instagram comments or in an op-ed that just gets it all wrong. This can even be a debate you have with yourself.You probably know about the apocalyptic possibilities for American democracy. Fundamentally, this country doesn’t work if the peaceful transfer of power does not work. This country doesn’t work, and didn’t work in living memory, if people can’t vote. And there might be a threshold at which it doesn’t work if enough people don’t trust election results. Those existential questions have now been channeled into concrete problems: In 2022, people called up election offices and left death threats; people in tactical gear staked out voter drop boxes; election offices installed bulletproof glass. Republicans fielded candidates in Arizona and Pennsylvania who ran on the premise that elections in this country were a lie. Millions watched the Jan. 6 hearings that delved into how chaotic and fragile the final days of the Trump White House really were.Then, in this fragile landscape of trust, there were the courts. In the summer, the Supreme Court fully overturned Roe v. Wade, a decision long expected, but one that still seemed to shock even the people who wanted it — even after the surreal publication of a drafted opinion in the spring. The fact that it really did happen — that suddenly a woman had to drive into another state to get an abortion so that she wouldn’t potentially die from complications — not only carried that kind of real-life consequence in a thousand private moments of people’s lives, but also opened up a world of other possibilities about what could happen. Maybe the court would roll back marriage equality. Or sign off on “independent state legislature” theory, an obscure theory adopted by a group of right-wingers that would grant expanded powers to state legislatures in carrying out elections and risk destabilizing the entire system.Accompanying all these events was a disorienting, high-stakes discourse about how to talk about conspiracy theories and antidemocratic threats, and about how much to do so. We know that what people say — what we say — on social platforms, and certainly in the media, shapes the way people perceive politics, but in a way that can be hard to measure — an awareness that can convert every piece or post into an opportunity or mistake. Writers argued that excessively focusing on democracy might alienate, rather than persuade, voters, or even corrupt institutions by intertwining constitutional and partisan concerns.Then there was the world beyond discourse, where no one could control much of anything beyond one man. For months, for years, since the 2014 annexation of Crimea and the West’s tepid response to it, people had warned that Vladimir Putin would eventually launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine — then it happened. Not many people in Russia or anywhere else seemed to want this beyond Mr. Putin, but that did nothing to prevent Ukraine from becoming the kind of place where a boy has to figure out for himself that troops shot his mother and stepfather because nobody knows how to tell him, where people had to drink the water from radiators to stay alive, where reflecting on brutal deaths in one city, someone can find themselves grimly observing, “In theory, international bodies have the authority to prosecute war crimes wherever and whenever they occur.” More

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      Your Monday Briefing: Argentina Triumphs

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      Plus: A Times analysis of how Russia bungled the invasion.Lionel Messi lifted the World Cup trophy after leading Argentina to victory.Dan Mullan/Getty ImagesArgentina wins the World CupIt was the most extraordinary World Cup final in history. And Lionel Messi, who played a career-defining game, is at the center of Argentina’s victory.Messi, 35, cemented his claim to be the greatest player to have ever played the game. In what he has said would be his last World Cup game — and his first-ever World Cup victory — Messi scored two of the team’s three goals as well as the first goal in the team’s penalty shootouts.Argentina scored two goals in the first half, as France seemed slack and uncertain. Then, Kylian Mbappé surged forward. In the space of under two minutes, he scored back-to-back second-half goals, tying the game.In extra time, Messi scored his second goal of the game: 3-2, Argentina. Then, Mbappé scored on a penalty kick to tie the game at 3-3. The teams went to a shootout. Argentina won on penalties, 4-2, as the stadium crowd burst into tears of joy and grief.Highlights: Watch all 12 goals.Mbappé: The 23-year-old French superstar is the first man since 1966 to score three goals in a World Cup final. He won the Golden Boot, which goes to the tournament’s top scorer.Messi: He left Argentina at 13 and has lived in the shadow of Diego Maradona, who last hoisted the World Cup trophy for Argentina 36 years ago. Now, the country has unequivocally embraced its native son. He won the Golden Ball, as the tournament’s best player.Russia’s invasion plans showed that it was expecting to overrun Kyiv within hours of invading Ukraine.operativnoZSU, via TelegramHow Russia fumbled the warMy colleagues have published a sweeping account of how Russia mismanaged its invasion of Ukraine, based on battle plans, intercepts and interviews with Russian soldiers and Kremlin confidants. Here are some major points:Wounded Russian soldiers said they had little training, food or supplies. Some turned to Wikipedia to learn how to use their weapons.President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle fed his suspicions and magnified his grievances. The war was planned in such secrecy that his spokesman and chief of staff learned of it only after it began.One NATO member is warning allies that Putin may accept the death or injury of as many as 300,000 Russian troops, roughly three times his estimated losses so far.Invading Russian troops used their cellphones to call home, revealing their positions to Ukraine’s military.Read the piece in full.For more: “It was a cascade of failures, and at the top is Putin’s own misguidedness, his own isolation and his own conviction that he knew what was best,” Anton Troianovski, the Moscow bureau chief, told The Morning newsletter.Other updates:Ukraine said that Russia may sharply escalate the war in a winter offensive.Ukrainians raced to restore critical services after Russia fired dozens of missiles at Ukrainian power stations over the weekend.Putin made a rare visit to his war headquarters, signaling a shift to his more active involvement.Russian data journalists and volunteers are trying to count the country’s dead soldiers.Yesterday’s launches were North Korea’s first missile tests since it fired an ICBM a month ago.Shin Jun-Hee/YONHAP, via Associated PressNorth Korea tests more weaponsNorth Korea fired two medium-range ballistic missiles yesterday, which could potentially reach Japan. The missiles fell into the waters between the two countries.The launches came just days after Japan vowed to ​double its military spending to help guard against the growing threats from China and North Korea. Future conflicts ​over the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan could involve ​Japan.The State of the WarA Botched Invasion: Secret battle plans, intercepts and interviews with soldiers and Kremlin confidants offer new insight into the stunning failures of Russia’s military in Ukraine.The War in the Skies: As Ukrainian officials warn that Russia might be preparing for a new ground offensive this winter, waves of Russian missiles continue to batter Ukraine’s infrastructure. The attacks are leaving a trail of destruction and grief.Russian Draft: A Times reporter spoke to Russians at a draft office in Moscow to gauge how they felt about going to war.The Next Front? Using missiles and saboteurs, Ukraine is focusing on the strategically important city of Melitopol, ahead of an expected Ukrainian offensive to drive Russian forces from southern Ukraine.The new plans called for Japan, which has long been officially pacifist, to acquire​ counterstrike abilities, including​ missiles that could be used to target bases in enemy territory in response to an attack.Context: North Korea fired missiles that flew over Japan in 2017 and again in October.Background: Last week, North Korea tested​ a ​powerful new engine for an intercontinental ballistic missile​, as part of its effort to switch from liquid to solid fuel, which could make missiles easier to transport and faster to launch​.Markets: The growing consensus about the emergence of a new era of superpower confrontation is boosting arms makers.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificFiji’s election pitted two former coup leaders against each other.Saeed Khan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFiji finished counting its votes. There is no clear winner, The Associated Press reports, and parties are negotiating to form a coalition government.Crematories and funeral homes in Beijing are busy, Reuters reports. China reversed its pandemic restrictions earlier this month.At least 19 people died yesterday near Kabul, Afghanistan, when a fuel tanker exploded, CNN reports.A landslide in Malaysia killed at least 24 people, Reuters reports.Around the WorldTaraneh Alidoosti, an Iranian actress, is one of the highest-profile people to be arrested after expressing support for the antigovernment protests.Tunisia held its first parliamentary elections since a presidential power grab last year. Some see the overhauled process as key to fighting corruption. Others think it is a charade.Twitter suspended and reinstated the accounts of several journalists. Some had written critically about Elon Musk.U.S. NewsSam Bankman-Fried, the FTX founder who is in jail in the Bahamas, is expected to agree to be extradited to the U.S.The T.S.A. intercepted a record number of guns at airport security checkpoints this year.P-22, the celebrity mountain lion in Los Angeles, was euthanized.A Morning ReadGetty ImagesWe may be in a new epoch in Earth’s history: the Anthropocene, the age of humans.“If you were around in 1920, your attitude would have been, ‘Nature’s too big for humans to influence,’ ” said the chair of a panel of scientists, which has spent more than a decade deliberating whether we are in a new epoch.The past century has upended that thinking, he said. “It’s been a shock event, a bit like an asteroid hitting the planet.”ARTS AND IDEASIndia’s embattled love languagePradeep Sahil, a poet and lyricist, drew an appreciative crowd with his recitation.Saumya Khandelwal for The New York TimesFor centuries, Urdu was a prominent language of culture and poetry in India. Its literature and journalism — often advanced by writers who rebelled against religious dogma — played important roles in the country’s independence struggle against British colonial rule and in the spread of socialist fervor later in the 20th century.But in more recent decades, the language has faced dual threats from politics and the quest for economic prosperity. Urdu — a language spoken widely in Pakistan, India’s archrival — is now stigmatized as foreign. Parents increasingly enroll their children in schools that teach English or other Indian languages better suited for the job market.Still, more than 300,000 people celebrated Urdu verse during a three-day festival in New Delhi this month. The gathering, the Jashn-e-Rekhta poetry festival, was a testament to Urdu’s staying power as the key language of romantic expression in India’s songs and films, which draw heavily on Urdu poetry.For more: Mujib Mashal, my colleague, shared videos of one of his favorite moments from the festival on Twitter.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookArmando Rafael for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Cyd Raftus McDowell.For a holiday main, check out this rosy, crusted roasted beef tenderloin.What to ReadFor some last-minute holiday shopping, here are nine new books our editors recommend, with stories from Iceland and Nigeria to Tokyo and outer space.What to Watch“The Super 8 Years” collects the memories of Annie Ernaux, the French writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature this year.Modern LoveHe was married. She was looking for adventure. It somehow all worked out.The Faces QuizCan you recognize these newsmakers of 2022?Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Large in scope (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. Have a lovely week! See you tomorrow. — AmeliaP.S. The movie “Titanic” premiered 25 years ago today.Start your week with this narrated long read about two Chinese immigrants in New York City. And here’s Friday’s edition of “The Daily,” on A.I. Or check out “Hard Fork,” where our hosts make their tech predictions for 2023.Email us at briefing@nytimes.com with any questions or concerns. More

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      Brittney Griner Swap Puts Spotlight on Americans in Russia

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      Westerners in Russia have to weigh the risks of living and working in the country against professional and financial opportunities there.MOSCOW — After almost 10 months of war, sanctions, nuclear threats and the constant monitoring of the Russian security state, some American and European citizens continue to live and work in Russia, drawn in many cases by professional opportunities and higher salaries.Some Western athletes, businesspeople and artists chose to stay even as the Russian authorities arrested and jailed the American basketball player Brittney Griner in February on a minor drug charge. On Thursday, she was freed and sent back to the United States in a prisoner exchange for a notorious Russian arms dealer, Viktor Bout, in a move that some Republican politicians and analysts have said puts other Americans at risk of being wrongfully detained for political gain.Ms. Griner’s detention has injected a complex new factor into the calculation of whether to travel to, or work in, Russia, an already fraught decision with the war in Ukraine as a backdrop.More than 1,000 multinational companies have curtailed their operations in Russia since the invasion, with foreign managers often being the first to go. Most Western universities have halted student exchange programs with Russian peers. And most major European and American cultural institutions have ended collaborations with Russian theaters and museums, including the Bolshoi in Moscow and the Mariinsky in St. Petersburg, two of the world’s most storied houses for opera and ballet.But in other areas the numbers of Westerners have held steady or even grown since Ms. Griner’s arrest. Most choose to come or stay to advance careers, but there are also examples of Americans who made Russia their home for political reasons. Most famously, they include the actor Steven Seagal and the former intelligence analyst Edward Snowden, who just this month took an oath of Russian citizenship.The actor Steven Seagal watching a military parade in the Red Square in Moscow, in 2015.Sergei Ilnitsky/European Pressphoto AgencyAthletes have long provided one of the biggest streams of prominent Westerners to Russia. Players “whose careers were declining went there to maintain the same level of income that they were accustomed to,” said Bill Neff, an agent with clients across the world.After the outbreak of the war, the Russian teams in the Continental Hockey League, which includes Russia and its neighbors, lost nearly half of its foreign players. Finns and Swedes led the exodus, largely abiding by their countries’ hard-line stance toward Russia’s aggression.But after the initial outflow, some of the European vacancies are being filled by American and Canadian players. They include Scott Wilson, a Canadian who won N.H.L. championships with the Pittsburgh Penguins, and an American, Alexander Chmelevski, both of whom joined Russian teams this fall.There are now an estimated 42 Americans playing or planning to play in Russia’s premier men’s basketball league, up from 30 a few months ago, according to tallies by American sports agents. An analysis of team rosters shows that there are an additional 29 American and Canadian hockey players who are signed to premier Russian teams this season, with some joining after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. There is even an American playing for the Russian woman’s basketball team that Ms. Griner represented before her arrest.The Release of Brittney GrinerThe American basketball star had been detained in Russia since February on charges of smuggling hashish oil into the country.Anxiety Turns to Relief: Brittney Griner’s supporters watched with dismay as her situation appeared to worsen over the summer. Now they are celebrating her release.The Russian Playbook: By detaining Ms. Griner, the Kremlin weaponized pain to get the United States to turn over a convicted arms dealer. Can the same tactic work in the war in Ukraine?A Test for Women’s Sports: The release was a victory for W.N.B.A. players and fans, who pushed furiously for it. But the athlete’s plight also highlighted gender inequities in sports.These athletes have stayed despite warnings from the State Department, which is advising all Americans to leave Russia immediately, weighing the risks of playing in Russia against professional and financial opportunities in a major sports market.Alexander Chmelevski playing for the San Jose Sharks last year.Jae C. Hong/Associated PressMany agents representing American athletes did not respond to queries about Ms. Griner’s detention in Russia. Those who did said the prisoner swap that brought her home had no effect on their work or their clients.“Griner’s case has to do with things that have nothing to do with basketball,” said David Carro, a Spanish sports agent representing four male American basketball players in Russia. “We never had any problems when Brittney Griner was there, and now, even less so.”“Our Americans get paid promptly and are living very well in Russia,” he added.Many American basketball players come to Russia to make money in the off-season or to prolong their careers. Because Russia covets top-level “name’’ players, they often pay high salaries. Athletes can take in more than $1 million and often receive free housing and cars.Mr. Neff, who represents about 30 professional basketball players, said Ms. Griner’s freedom did not lessen his caution in sending players to Russia during the conflict with Ukraine. He has discouraged his clients from going there and does not currently have any players in Russia.“I don’t think it changes anything,” Mr. Neff said of her release. “If you send someone to Russia, you know there are risks. Is the increased money worth the risk? That’s the choice you’re making.”The American basketball player K.C. Rivers, 35, came to Russia in August, while Ms. Griner was on trial, to play for the team of Samara, a provincial capital more than 500 miles east of Moscow.“At this point I didn’t really have so many options coming my way,” Mr. Rivers said in an interview in September. “What’s the best thing for me right now, towards — I ain’t going to say the end of my career — but in my career at this point? Financially, what makes sense?”K.C. Rivers playing for Zenit St. Petersburg during a Euroleague basketball game in Athens last year.John Andreou/EPA, via ShutterstockThe Russian basketball clubs are playing fewer games this season because of their suspension from Euroleague competition, a penalty that has diminished the quality of players the league has attracted, Mr. Neff said. And Russia’s hockey league voted this month to slash the number of foreigners that will be allowed on each team starting next season, an example of wartime nationalism sweeping the country.There are still a few Americans imprisoned in Russia. One is Paul Whelan, who was detained in December 2018, convicted of espionage and sentenced to 16 years in a penal colony; the U.S. State Department says he has been wrongfully detained. Marc Fogel, a 60-year-old history teacher, was detained in 2021 for having about half an ounce of medical marijuana. He was sentenced in June to 14 years in a penal colony.During a visit to Kyrgyzstan on Friday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia commented on the possibility of new prisoner exchanges with the United States.“Everything is possible and contacts continue through the special services,” he said at a news conference.George Beebe, a former director of the C.I.A.’s Russia analysis and a Russia adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney, said that while there were risks for Americans in Russia, he did not think the Bout-Griner swap had increased the chances of an American’s being arrested on trumped-up pretexts.Paul Whelan, an American imprisoned in Russia, in a Moscow courtroom in 2020.Maxim Shemetov/Reuters“For American citizens that are living and working in Russia, I wouldn’t say that there is no danger,” Mr. Beebe, the program director at the Quincy Institute think tank, said in a telephone interview. “Certainly there is. The Russian government is not likely to be at all lenient in dealing with Americans. They’re not going to give any Americans the benefit of the doubt.”However, he said, “I don’t think it increases the likelihood that the Russian government is going to arrest Americans.”Andrei A. Soldatov, a Russian journalist who specializes in the security services, said it was hard to make predictions when the rules of the game are constantly changing. During the Cold War era, he said, the rules were defined and predictable. But with the war in Ukraine continuing to escalate, diplomacy is entering uncharted territory.“We all have this temptation always to compare this to the Cold War, but this is nothing like that,” he said in a telephone interview.“The Cold War was a period when nobody wanted or was actually interested in a hot war. And now we have a really big war which might get bigger,” he said. “Nobody can actually rationalize or predict and develop a strategy accordingly — that’s a problem.”Valerie Hopkins More

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      Inside the Face-Off Between Russia and a Small Internet Access Firm

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      The cat-and-mouse experience of Proton, a Swiss company, shows what it’s like to be targeted by Russian censors — and what it takes to fight back.After Moscow erected a digital barricade in March, blocking access to independent news sites and social media platforms to hide information about its unfolding invasion of Ukraine, many Russians looked for a workaround. One reliable route they found came from a small Swiss company based nearly 2,000 miles away.The company, Proton, provides free software that masks a person’s identity and location online. That gives a user in Russia access to the open web by making it appear that the person is logging in from the Netherlands, Japan or the United States. A couple of weeks after the internet blockade, about 850,000 people inside Russia used Proton each day, up from fewer than 25,000.That is, until the end of March, when the Russian government found a way to block Proton, too.Targeting Proton was the opening salvo of a continuing back-and-forth battle, pitting a team of about 25 engineers against a country embarking on one of the most aggressive censorship campaigns in recent memory.Working from a Geneva office where the company keeps its name off the building directory, Proton has spent nine pressure-packed months repeatedly tweaking its technology to avoid Russian blocks, only to be countered again by government censors in Moscow. Some employees took Proton off their social media profiles out of concern that they would be targeted personally.The high-stakes chess match mirrors what is playing out with growing frequency in countries facing coups, wars and authoritarian rule, where restricting the internet is a tool of repression. The blocks drive citizens to look for workarounds. Engineers at companies like Proton think up new ways for those people to secretly reach the open web. And governments, in turn, seek out new technical tricks to plug leaks.The digital censorship battle is reaching “an inflection point,” said Grant Baker, a research analyst for technology and democracy at Freedom House, which recently reported that internet censorship globally had reached a new high in 2022. While Russia has spent years working on a more closely controlled, sovereign internet, the controls imposed after the war are “a stark contrast” to anything Moscow had ever done before, Mr. Baker said.Companies rarely discuss being targeted by an authoritarian government out of fear of escalating the conflict. But Andy Yen, Proton’s founder and chief executive, said that after a period of trying to keep its “head down,” Proton wanted to raise awareness about the increasing sophistication of governments, in Russia and elsewhere, to block citizens from reaching the open web and the need for technologists, companies and governments to push back.Proton’s account provides a rare inside look at what it’s like to be entangled in Russia’s censorship net as President Vladimir V. Putin tries to suppress information about the war and mounting battlefield losses in Ukraine.Dozens of VPN services have been blocked inside Russia, but Proton, perhaps best known for its encrypted email service, seemed to receive extra attention from the authorities. In June, Russia’s internet regulator labeled the company a “threat.”“We’re gearing up for a long fight,” Mr. Yen said in an interview at the company’s office. “Everybody hopes this will have a happy ending, but it’s not guaranteed. We don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, in fact, but you keep going because if we don’t do it, then maybe nobody else will.”The VPN team at Proton, whose virtual private network gives users a way around government internet restrictions.Aurélien Bergot for The New York TimesProton, which makes money by selling $10-a-month subscriptions for extra features, was founded in 2014 by a team of young engineers from the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, the institute outside Geneva where the worldwide web was created. Their main project was working on the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest particle accelerator, a $5 billion instrument built to unlock some of the world’s biggest scientific mysteries.After the disclosures of mass digital surveillance that were made by Edward Snowden, the former U.S. intelligence contractor, Mr. Yen and a few colleagues created an email service that encrypts messages so they cannot be intercepted, simplifying use of a technology that had been too complicated for many people. It became popular with activists, journalists and privacy-conscious consumers.The State of the WarStriking Deep in Russia: In its most brazen attack into Russian territory, Ukraine used drones to strike two military bases hundreds of miles inside Russia, showing an ability to take the war beyond its borders.Weaponizing Winter: Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure have left millions without power, heat or water as the snow begins to fall. The Daily looks at what life is like in Ukraine as winter sets in.Russian Oil Price Cap: The E.U. agreed on a $60-a-barrel limit for Russian oil, the latest effort by Western allies to try to deprive Moscow of revenue to finance its war in Ukraine. Here’s how it will work.Mr. Yen, who grew up in Taiwan, said the threat of Chinese aggression looming over the island’s democracy had shaped his worldview. Privacy and fighting censorship were core to Proton’s mission from the start, he said, and the company seemed to almost relish confronting authoritarianism.In 2017, after several governments, including Turkey and Russia, temporarily blocked access to the email service, Proton created its virtual private network, or VPN, a technology used to sidestep internet restrictions.The technology behind a VPN traces back to the 1990s. It is a relatively basic tool used most commonly by people trying to pirate movies or watch a sports broadcast available only in another country. Yet in recent years the systems, which are easy to use and often difficult to detect, have become a vital tool for circumventing internet restrictions.The Kremlin spent years building the legal foundation and technological abilities to control the internet more closely. Yet even as Russia blocked certain websites and interrupted access to Twitter last year, few thought it would outright block major social media platforms and independent news websites. While television has always been heavily censored, the internet had been less restricted.The crackdown in March interrupted communications and commerce for many otherwise apolitical Russians, said Natalia Krapiva, tech-legal counsel at Access Now, a group focused on online speech-related issues. VPN use was already high among tech-savvy Russians, she said, but the blocks and news of harsh punishment for online protest led even more casual internet users to seek ways around the restrictions.Demand for VPNs surged in Russia, with downloads in March jumping 2,692 percent from February, said Simon Migliano, head of research for the review site Top10VPN.com. Proton was a popular choice, he said, hovering among the 10 most popular products despite being slower than some other choices.Since then, VPNs have become a way of life for many. Roskomsvoboda, a Russian civil society group focused on internet freedom, estimates that a quarter of the Russian population is using one.“To simply read independent news or to post a picture, you had to open your VPN,” said Viktoriia Safonova, 25, who now delivers food by bike in Sweden after she fled Russia in July. Both she and her husband were racked by anxiety after the invasion. Finding independent news and information was difficult. Workarounds often weren’t reliable.“If the one you’re using gets blocked, you have to find another VPN,” Ms. Safonova said.She recalled the paranoia that set in as new internet restrictions and surveillance took effect. She and her husband, Artem Nesterenko, worried about whether they could criticize the war online, even on international social networks. He recalled how the police had come to check on their building after he scrawled “No to war” in the elevator. He feared being arrested for things he posted online.As people turned to VPN services to avoid the blocks, Proton struggled to keep up. Over a weekend in March, engineers scrambled to buy and configure more than 20 new servers to avert a crash of its entire network.At the same time in Moscow, censors were at work trying to patch holes in the government’s internet controls.The first block that took down Proton, at the end of March, was a technically basic interruption that company engineers quickly overcame, but they figured more powerful attempts loomed.The battle took on a “Spy vs. Spy” dynamic in Proton’s headquarters. Mr. Yen said a network of people within the government, telecommunications firms and civil society groups had helped Proton operate in Russia, providing access to local networks and sharing intelligence about how the censorship system worked. But those contacts began to go dark as the Kremlin’s crackdown on dissent intensified.At the start of June, censors struck again.The service, which had more than 1.4 million daily users inside Russia at this point, collapsed as employees were going about their day. Complaints from Russian users poured into Proton’s customer service email. The company concluded that the government had deployed more sophisticated software that could filter through all internet traffic to identify when a person was trying to connect to Proton’s VPN service. Russia had used similar technology to block Twitter and other social media sites.Around this time, the company noticed a suspicious spike in negative reviews of its service in the Apple and Google app stores, reducing its search ranking.“They had clearly studied us,” said Antonio Cesarano, a senior engineer working on the VPN project.Some at Proton questioned whether they should continue the fight with Russia. It was costing millions of dollars and slowing down development of other products. But after Proton faced criticism in 2021, when the French police obtained the IP address of a climate activist using its email service, backing down from Russia could have added another bruise to the company’s reputation.Over about two weeks in June, Proton created yet another workaround that bounced internet traffic to servers in different geographical areas faster than censors could track. It was a technically complex move that would take considerable resources for Russia to counter.The fix worked — for about six weeks.Mr. Yen was interrupted during a staff meeting in mid-July with news that Russian censors had come up with an even more elaborate block. A corporate chart from the time shows use dropping off a cliff. Russian engineers had identified what is known as an authentication “handshake,” the vital moment when Proton’s VPN connection gets established before reaching the wider web. Blocking the link made Proton’s service essentially unusable.“We had no idea what was happening and how they were doing it,” Mr. Cesarano said.By August, after working around the clock for days to find a fix, Proton acknowledged defeat and pulled its app from Russia. The company has spent the months since then developing a new architecture that makes its VPN service harder to identify because it looks more like a regular website to censorship software scanning a country’s internet traffic. Proton has been successfully testing the system in Iran, where Proton has seen a sharp increase in VPN use during recent political demonstrations.In Russia, Proton has reintroduced its apps using the new system. Mr. Yen acknowledged that it probably wasn’t a long-term fix. He has confidence in the new technology, but figures Russian engineers will eventually figure out a new way to push back, and the game will continue. More