Your Tuesday Briefing

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/22/briefing/mariupol-russia-ukraine-plane-crash.html

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Residents of Mariupol, Ukraine, braced for renewed attacks after the Ukrainian government rejected Russia’s ultimatum to surrender the besieged and ravaged southern port city. Efforts to reach hundreds of thousands of people trapped there remained fraught with danger. Follow the latest updates from the war.

The violence formed a backdrop to new consultations between the U.S. and its allies over how to ratchet up pressure on Russia. President Biden spoke by telephone with the leaders of Britain, France, Germany and Italy in advance of his trip to Brussels tomorrow to meet with NATO leaders.

The alliance may take up Poland’s proposal to create an international peacekeeping force for Ukraine, an idea U.S. officials have cast doubt on. It is not clear how the plan would work. In the past, such peacekeeping missions were deployed only after the fighting had ended.

Kyiv: A missile strike — one of the most powerful explosions to hit the Ukrainian capital since the invasion began — turned a once-bustling shopping mall into a smoldering ruin. Russian forces are aiming artillery, rockets and bombs at civilian as well as military targets, after failing to quickly seize control of Ukraine’s major cities.

Dispatch: In the ancient Ukrainian city of Lviv, simple rituals have taken on new and sometimes surreal meanings.

In other news from the war:

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, said a relief convoy near Kharkiv was hijacked by Russian forces. Russian shelling killed a 96-year-old concentration camp survivor in the city.

A Russian court ruled that Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, is an extremist organization and banned it from operating on Russia’s territory.

Here are resources to avoid sharing misinformation about the war.

Thousands of firefighters, police officers and paramilitary troops have assembled to search for survivors after a passenger plane with 132 people on board crashed yesterday into a steep, heavily wooded site in southern China. Chinese state media said no survivors had been found.

The first rescuers found only debris and fires. The remoteness of the crash site could make it inaccessible to large rescue equipment, a local official said. Rain and heavy winds most likely hampered rescue efforts overnight. Follow updates here.

The plane descended more than 20,000 feet in just over a minute, according to data from a tracking platform. The plane, a Boeing 737-800, is a mainstay of airline fleets around the world and has a strong safety record. The flight was operated by China Eastern Airlines, China’s second-biggest carrier, which had not had a crash in 18 years.

Background: A newer model, the Boeing 737 Max, has not resumed flying in China after a ban prompted by deadly crashes in Indonesia in 2018 and Ethiopia in 2019. China has had a strong airline safety record after a succession of deadly accidents in the 1990s.

On the first day of Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation hearings for the Supreme Court, more than 20 senators discussed what they wanted in a nominee. Race was not always an unspoken subtext, as one senator suggested that tough questioning would be criticized as racism, while another wondered aloud whether Jackson intended to incorporate critical race theory into the legal system.

Republican senators emphasized that they would not personally attack Jackson, but in the same breath accused her of being lenient on child sexual abuse defendants and sex offenders. Several also suggested, without evidence, that she was aligned with progressive groups interested in adding more justices to the Supreme Court.

Finally, after more than four hours, Jackson spoke for herself: “I have been a judge for nearly a decade now, and I take that responsibility and my duty to be independent very seriously,” she said. “I evaluate the facts and I interpret and apply the law to the facts of the case before me without fear or favor, consistent with my judicial oath.”

Context: Jackson has already passed the Senate’s confirmation test three times for appointments to lower courts; Democrats can confirm her without one Republican vote if they stay united. Here’s what to expect in these hearings, an analysis of her rulings and a look at how she got here.

Health officials in the U.S. announced that they would convene a meeting to discuss the country’s Covid-19 booster strategy on April 6.

Hong Kong will lift its ban on flights from nine countries on April 1 and cut quarantine times for vaccinated residents returning from overseas to seven days from 14.

England’s health service began offering a second Covid-19 booster to people who are considered especially vulnerable to the disease.

Here are the latest updates and maps of the pandemic.

The U.S. formally accused Myanmar of committing genocide against its minority Rohingya population.

A judge in South Africa ordered Amazon to halt construction on its proposed African headquarters, arguing that the developers had not adequately consulted Indigenous communities.

Saudi Aramco will invest in more oil production.

A copy of the 1939 comic book “Marvel Comics No. 1” sold at auction for $2.4 million.

An asteroid was detected two hours before it crashed into the sea near Greenland, a sign of the growing sophistication of NASA’s planetary defense system.

The top U.S. financial regulator said that public companies must disclose how their work affects the climate, giving initial approval to a much-anticipated rule.

Red-crowned cranes have come back from the brink of extinction on the Japanese island of Hokkaido after a decades-long effort.

Named for the discs of red skin on their heads, the cranes symbolize loyalty and longevity and are a major tourist draw. The next step is helping them survive independently in the wild.

The long-running Eurovision Song Contest pits countries against one another for pop supremacy. Acts like ABBA (Sweden), Celine Dion (Switzerland) and Julio Iglesias (Spain) were all competitors once.

Now, the U.S. wants to recreate some of Eurovision’s magic with “American Song Contest,” hosted by Kelly Clarkson and Snoop Dogg. Here’s a primer.

Will I know any of the songs? Nope, they have to be new, though contestants don’t have to write their own stuff.

Who’s competing? The contest has 56 entries, ranging from Sabyu, from the Northern Mariana Islands (population 47,000), to Sweet Taboo, representing California (nearly 40 million people). Jewel (who grew up yodeling in famously tough conditions in Alaska), Michael Bolton (Connecticut) and Sisqó (Maryland) are among the famous names.

Eurovision has some crazy performances. Will this version? “One person’s cliché is another person’s truth,” an executive producer said. “Some of them are self-aware, some of them aren’t.”

This vegetarian chow mein is stained with soy sauce and has a robust vegetable-to-noodle ratio.

Charlotte Gainsbourg makes her directorial debut in “Jane by Charlotte,” an elusive portrait of her mother, the French-English star Jane Birkin.

The Mexican town of Escolásticas is home to around 200 open-air carving workshops, from which an astonishing array of sculptures continuously emerges.

Play today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Barking a lot, like a small dog (five letters).

Here’s today’s Wordle and the Spelling Bee.

You can find all our puzzles here.

That’s it for today’s briefing. Thanks for joining me. — Natasha

P.S. The Times announced its 2022-23 Fellowship Class, early-career journalists who will join the newsroom for a year.

The latest episode of “The Daily” is on Covid-19.

Sanam Yar wrote today’s Arts and Ideas. You can reach Natasha and the team at briefing@nytimes.com.