Good morning. We’re covering a growing farmers’ rebellion in India, North Korea’s dwindling trade with China and a gender gap in British youth sports. | |  By Melina Delkic and Dani Blum | | | A farmer praying at the protests near New Delhi on Monday. Danish Siddiqui/Reuters | | | The farmers arrived in tractors and trailers, some traveling from hundreds of miles away. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s top lieutenants said they were willing to negotiate — but not until the farmers moved to New Delhi’s outskirts and stopped blocking highways. The farmers insist they will not move their tractors or trailers until negotiations start, and have vowed to stay put for weeks. | | | New rules: The farm policies pushed through Parliament in September are the beginning of the end of a decades-old system that had guaranteed minimum prices for certain crops. The Modi administration hopes they will encourage investment, but farmers say they were never consulted. | | | Context: In India, more than 60 percent of the population depends on agriculture to make a living. Farmers are a huge political constituency. The first protests started in July, in Haryana and in Punjab. | | | Kim Jong-un met with government officials on Sunday. Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service, via Associated Press | | | According to customs data released by Beijing, North Korea’s imports from China from January to October plummeted by 76 percent. In October, North Korea’s imports from China dropped by nearly 99 percent from the previous month. | | | Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, “harshly criticized” his government agencies for their handling of the economy, state media reported on Monday. Mr. Kim all but sealed North Korea’s borders with China earlier this year. North Korea insists that it has not registered a single case of the virus, but outsiders remain skeptical. | | ■ The drugmaker Moderna said it would apply this week to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to authorize its coronavirus vaccine for emergency use. The first injections may be given as early as Dec. 21 if the process goes smoothly and approval is granted, the company’s chief executive said. ■ By the end of the third week of England’s second national lockdown, which began early this month, the number of new coronavirus cases had fallen 30 percent, according to new data. | | | Hong Kong judges at a ceremony in January. Philip Fong/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images | | | As the Chinese Communist Party extends its grip over Hong Kong, pro-Beijing forces are increasingly targeting the city’s independent judiciary. | | | State newspapers have claimed the judges are lenient toward protesters. Party officials have called for an overhaul of the courts. The city’s leadership has exerted more influence over the selection of judges. | | | The national security law that Beijing passed this summer gives the state even more authority over Hong Kong’s courts. China’s legislature also forced the ouster of four lawmakers in November, exercising new powers that some lawyers and legal scholars worry could be turned against judges. | | | Lauren Justice for The New York Times | | | In the U.S., teachers have been at the center of a debate about reopening schools — often vilified for challenging it, sometimes praised for trying to make it work. But the debate has often missed just how thoroughly the coronavirus pandemic has upended learning in the country’s 130,000 schools. | | | Our reporter spoke with educators about the immense challenges. “The days where it’s 13-plus hours at school, you’re just exhausted, hoping to make it to the car at night,” said an English teacher toggling between online and in-person learning. “We’re seeing an extreme level of teacher burnout.” | | | PAID POST: A MESSAGE FROM CAMPAIGN MONITOR | | TEST: Email Marketing 101: Never Sacrifice Beauty for Simplicity | | A drag-and-drop email builder, a gallery of templates and turnkey designs, personalized customer journeys, and engagement segments. It's everything you need to create stunning, results-driven email campaigns in minutes. And with Campaign Monitor, you have access to it all, along with award-winning support around the clock. It's beautiful email marketing done simply. | | | Learn More | | | | Tokyo Stock Exchange: The president and chief executive of the exchange, Koichiro Miyahara, resigned on Monday. His decision comes two months after a technical glitch at the exchange shut down equities trading across Japan. | | | Pro-Trump dissidents: Human rights defenders in Asia are worried that President-elect Joe Biden will be more accommodating with China than President Trump. Mr. Trump’s popularity is particularly strong among Christians and ethnic minority activists in Southeast Asia. | | | New Zealand volcano: The country’s workplace safety regulator charged 13 parties, including government agencies, organizations and individuals, in connection with last year’s volcanic eruption on White Island that killed 22 people. | | | Mary Turner for The New York Times | | | Snapshot: Above, Philip Gill with his daughters playing football in Padiham, England. Mr. Gill started a petition calling for equal treatment of boys and girls teams during lockdown. Lockdowns have exacerbated gender inequalities in English youth clubs, where boys play on while girls at their level have to stay home. | | | What we’re reading: This article in Stuff in which the New Zealand media giant looks at the racist portrayal of the Maori people in its newspapers. It’s a gripping and thought-provoking accounting. | | | Con Poulos for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Susan Spungen. Prop Stylist: Paige Hicks. | | | Cook: Use cast-iron cookie stamps to leave imprints on these beautifully textured citrus shortbreads, flavored with tangy orange and lemon zests. | | | December is already here. At Home has ideas on what to read, cook, watch, and do while staying safe at home. | | | The singer-songwriter used his time spent indoors during the pandemic to record a new album, “McCartney III,” with him playing nearly all the instruments and handling all the production. It’s out Dec. 18. He spoke to our columnist David Marchese. | | | “At no point,” McCartney said, “did I think: ‘I’m making an album. I’d better be serious.’ This was more like: ‘You’re locked down. You can do whatever the hell you want.’” Which was a gas, as always. “What I’m amazed with,” McCartney explained, “is that I’m not fed up with music. Because, strictly speaking, I should have gotten bored years ago.” | | | Is there anything different about the nature of your musical gift today at 78 than in 1980 or 1970 or when you first started writing songs? | | | It’s the story that you’re telling. That changes. When I first said to John, “I’ve written a few songs,” they were simple. My first song was called “I Lost My Little Girl” — four chords. Then we went into the next phase of songwriting, which was talking to our fans. Those were songs like “Thank You Girl,” “Love Me Do,” “Please Please Me.” Then came a rich vein as we got more mature, with things like “Let It Be,” “The Long and Winding Road.” | | | But basically I think it’s all the same, and you get lucky sometimes. Like, “Let It Be” came from a dream where my mother had said that phrase. “Yesterday” came from a dream of a melody. I’m a great believer in dreams. I’m a great rememberer of dreams. | | | The Beatles broke up 50 years ago. You were in it for roughly 10 years. How central to your own story of your life are those 10 years? | | | Very. It’s like your high school memories — those are my Beatles memories. This is the danger: At a dinner party, I am liable to tell stories about my life, and people already know them. I can see everyone stifling a yawn. But the Beatles are inescapable. | | That’s it for this briefing. See you next time. — Melina and Dani | | Thank you
Carole Landry helped write this briefing. Theodore Kim and Jahaan Singh provided the break from the news. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com. | | | Were you sent this briefing by a friend? Sign up here to get the Morning Briefing. | | |
