Your Friday Briefing: Russia May Invade in ‘Coming Days,’ U.S. Warns

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/17/briefing/russia-ukraine-south-korea-covid.html

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We’re covering a U.S. warning of an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine and a shift in South Korea’s Covid strategy.

Despite Russia’s insistence that it is withdrawing troops from the border with Ukraine, U.S. officials warned that an invasion was imminent.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the U.N. Security Council that Russia’s “forces, including ground troops, aircraft, ships, are preparing to launch an attack against Ukraine in the coming days.”

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, who met with the head of NATO in Brussels, said Russia continued to move troops closer to Ukraine’s borders, was adding combat aircraft and was stocking up on blood supplies in anticipation of casualties on the battlefield.

President Biden warned that the threat of an attack remained “very high.” We have live updates.

On the ground: Artillery shells struck a town in eastern Ukraine on Thursday, damaging a kindergarten and wounding three adult civilians. Ukraine blamed Russia-backed separatists, while the Kremlin said “the Ukrainian side” had launched the first strike. The exchange of fire raised fears of an escalation.

Diplomacy: The U.S. State Department revealed that Russia had expelled the No. 2 American diplomat in Moscow. Also, in an official response to U.S. proposals about the crisis, the Kremlin said it was not planning any invasion but that if the U.S. did not agree to its demands, including lessening NATO’s presence in Eastern Europe, it would “be forced to respond” with military action.

Analysis: After 30 years of post-Cold War peace, the Ukraine crisis is shaking a sense of complacency among many Europeans, our chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe writes.

A confrontation between protesters and the police loomed in Ottawa on Thursday. Ontario’s police force gathered outside Ottawa’s city center in an apparent preparation to end the trucker protests that have stalled traffic there for the past few weeks.

The police have distributed written notices to the protesters, warning them to leave the area or face penalties. Crews of workers put up wire fencing around the Parliament building downtown.

Inside the building, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called on the protesters to go home. “It is high time that these illegal and dangerous activities stop, including here in Ottawa,” he said.

Many protesters vowed to stay put. One protester said their instructions were to remain in their trucks, lock the doors and not open them for anyone, including the police. Here’s the latest.

Background: The protests began weeks ago with a group of truckers who objected to a requirement that they be vaccinated against the coronavirus to cross the U.S.-Canada border. With help from right-wing activists, the protests ballooned into a broader movement opposed to pandemic measures and Trudeau in general.

With the Omicron variant of the coronavirus spreading quickly, the South Korean government says it is changing tack to focus almost exclusively on the most vulnerable.

After two years of effectively battling off major Covid-19 surges with its broad and heavy-handed three-T strategy — testing, tracing and treating — South Korean authorities have announced a new game plan: “select and focus.” The country is asking patients who test positive to look after themselves at home, while​ it redirects resources to those who are at greatest risk of dying.

The change, the government says, was necessary to cope with Omicron’s rise. Until last year, South Korea never had more than 7,849 confirmed cases a day. But as Omicron became dominant, the daily caseload soared to 93,135 on Thursday. The government expects up to 170,000 new patients a day later this month.

Critics have argued that the government’s new approach disadvantages underprivileged classes, like poor people who lack access to medical care or other social services. The new strategy will focus on people in their 60s and older and those with pre-existing medical conditions — supplying them with at-home treatment kits and calling twice a day to check on their condition.

Here are the latest updates and maps of the pandemic.

In other virus developments:

Global cases are dropping, but the W.H.O. is watching an Omicron subvariant.

As the U.S. seeks a return to normal, millions of Americans with risk factors feel ignored and abandoned.

Kamila Valieva, the 15-year-old Russian figure skating star who tested positive for a banned drug, failed to secure a medal in the women’s individual event. Her teammate Anna Shcherbakova won the gold.

The Canadian women’s hockey team beat the U.S. to win gold.

A New York Times reporter in Beijing sought out souvenirs of Bing Dwen Dwen, the ice-suit-clad panda who is the mascot of the Games, only to find hourslong lines and low stock on the most popular items.

France and its allies said that they would begin a military withdrawal from Mali, where its troops have been fighting insurgents for a decade. France’s decision capped a bitter breakdown in relations with Mali’s ruling junta.

Kuwait’s constitutional court overturned a law that had been used to prosecute transgender people.

Mudslides and flooding in Brazil swept through a mountainous region north of Rio de Janeiro, dumping a month’s worth of rain overnight and killing at least 94 people.

A day after Prince Andrew settled a sexual assault lawsuit, the London police announced they were investigating a charity led by Prince Charles.

An exhibition at the British Museum is aiming to use recent discoveries to lessen the mystery around Stonehenge. (No, it wasn’t built by extraterrestrials)

A Canadian journalist based in Kabul followed along with his friend and longtime translator as he fled economic uncertainty and political instability to find a new life in Europe. The journalist, Matthieu Aikins, went undercover disguised as a fellow migrant with the name “Habib,” allowing him to experience and document the life of a refugee.

A street child in Lusaka, Zambia, finds another boy dead in a mountain of trash. Who was he, and who killed him? That’s the mystery at the heart of “Walking the Bowl,” a new nonfiction book by Chris Lockhart and Daniel Mulilo Chama.

Lockhart, an American anthropologist, and Chama, a Zambian outreach worker, partnered with a team of former street children who helped them gather information. The story follows a 17-year-old hustler; a spindly 8-year-old who is alone in the city; a 16-year-old prostitute planning her escape; and Lusabilo, an observant 11-year-old boy who scavenges through trash. Their lives twine around one another; each, it turns out, has played a key role in the boy’s death.

“Daily life, meticulously recorded, rarely has the attributes of a novel,” Ellen Barry, a mental health reporter for The Times who was previously chief international correspondent, writes in a review, “a clean arc of ascending action, a handful of vivid characters, an ending that snaps shut like a purse. ‘Walking the Bowl,’ remarkably, has all of those.”

Adding fried eggs, a smoky yogurt sauce and crunchy almonds turns this sweet potato dish into a satisfying, meatless meal.

Get a glimpse into the lives of rich daughters over the past five centuries in “Heiresses,” by Laura Thompson.

“A Banquet” asks audiences to consider the overlaps between reality and fantasy, psychosis and evangelism.

Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: “baby horse” (four letters).

Here’s today’s Wordle. (If you’re worried about your stats streak, play in the browser you’ve been using.)

And here is today’s Spelling Bee.

You can find all our puzzles here.

That’s it for today’s briefing. Tell us what you think about this newsletter in this short survey. Thank you! See you next time. — Matthew

P.S. David Gelles, a Times business reporter, is joining the Climate desk to cover the intersection of business and climate policy.

The latest episode of “The Daily” is about the U.S. response to the crisis in Ukraine.

You can reach Matthew and the team at briefing@nytimes.com.