Evacuations of people fleeing embattled Ukrainian cities along safe corridors began Tuesday, while U.N. officials said the exodus of refugees from Russia’s invasion reached 2 million. The Russian onslaught has trapped people inside cities that are running low on food, water and medicine amid the biggest ground war in Europe since World War II. Previous attempts to lead civilians to safety have crumbled with renewed attacks. But on Tuesday, video posted by Ukrainian officials showed buses with people moving along a snowy road from the eastern city of Sumy and yellow buses with a red cross on them heading toward the southern port of Mariupol. With the invasion well into its second week, Russian troops have made significant advances in southern Ukraine but stalled in some other regions. Ukrainian soldiers and volunteers fortified the capital, Kyiv, with hundreds of checkpoints and barricades designed to thwart a takeover.
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After days of dramatically rising gas prices in wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the national average for a gallon of gas is now the highest in United States history, breaking the record that stood for nearly 14 years. As of Tuesday morning, the cost of regular gas in the U.S. is $4.17, according to AAA, up from $4.06 on Monday. Last week, the average cost was $3.60. The previous national average high was $4.11, set on July 17, 2008, according to AAA. The cost for diesel is also nearing the record of $4.84, which was also set in July 2008. The current price for a gallon of diesel is $4.75, over double what it was in October 2020. One of the main components of the rising costs is the ongoing invasion of Ukraine by Russian armed forces. Tom Kloza, chief global analyst for the Oil Price Information Service, previously told USA TODAY that Russia is the second-largest oil producer in the world, behind the United States.
Major League Baseball gave the players union a Tuesday night deadline to accept one of their options in a new proposal that would reinstate the 162-game season, with full pay, following negotiations in New York. There was no formal written offer, but MLB provided several hypotheticals that would give the union a choice of options in exchange for other tradeoffs. If no deal is reached by Tuesday night, or at least by early Wednesday, MLB officials said another week of regular-season games would be cancelled with players forfeiting pay.
President Joe Biden on Tuesday will try to pivot away from the domestic and foreign crises he currently faces to tackle a more personal issue: expanding health care for veterans who were exposed to toxins while serving abroad. Biden will travel to Texas to visit a Veterans Affairs clinic in Fort Worth, where he’ll meet with veteran health care providers and survivors and deliver remarks on the enduring health effects from exposure to burn pits, or massive, open-air ditches used to dispose of wartime waste that the president has linked to the death of his son, Beau Biden, who died of brain cancer in 2015. Advocates say the president, who campaigned on a promise to help soldiers exposed to toxic burn pits, is long overdue on elevating the issue.
International Women’s Day is observed Tuesday, celebrating the global “social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women,” according to the International Women’s Day website. The day also calls for action to advance gender equality. This year’s campaign theme — #BreaktheBias — spotlights the individual and collective biases against women that fuel gender inequality and asks the world to call out instances of bias against women in the workplace, at school and at home. The campaign asks that people show their support for this year’s theme by posting selfies to social media posing with their arms crossed along with the hashtags #BreaktheBias and #IWD2022. 
Contributing: Associated Press

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