One of New Zealand’s top lawmakers is getting international acclaim after he was filmed cradling a fellow lawmaker’s new baby during a debate in Parliament.

Trevor Mallard, the speaker of New Zealand’s House of Representatives, smiled as he held the baby and fed him with a bottle while presiding over a parliamentary session. The baby makes gurgling noise at one point when Mallard announces that one lawmaker’s time to speak in the debate has expired.

Mallard posted a photo of himself on Twitter holding lawmaker Tāmati Coffey’s one-month-old boy. “Today a VIP took the chair with me,” he tweeted. He congratulated Coffey, a fellow Labour lawmaker, and his partner on the new member of their family.

It was Coffey’s first day back from paternity leave. Another lawmaker posted a photo of Coffrey holding his newborn, to which Coffrey responded, “I JUST LOVE HIM!!”

Normally the Speaker’s chair is only used by Presiding Officers but today a VIP took the chair with me. Congratulations @tamatic..

(COPENHAGEN, Denmark) — A former Danish prime minister on Thursday lashed out at U.S. President Donald Trump for his tweet about military spending, saying defense willingness is not just about the amount of money spent.

Lars Loekke Rasmussen’s comment is the latest in an escalating spat between the U.S. and Denmark after Trump scrapped a visit to the country, saying current Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen was “nasty” when she rejected his idea of buying Greenland as an absurdity.

Loekke Rasmussen, who led the country until June, tweeted Thursday to Trump: “We have had (proportionally) exactly the same numbers of casualties in Afghanistan as US. We always stands firm and ready.”

Trump, who has urged NATO members to do more to meet the alliance’s goal of committing 2 percent of gross domestic product to defense, earlier tweeted that “Denmark is only at 1.35%.”

“We will not accept that our defense willingness is only about percentages,” Loekke Rasmussen tweeted. “I told you at the NA..

A fight is brewing over the lungs of the planet. Since taking office in January, Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro has overseen a surge in logging in the vast Amazon rain forest–and on Aug. 15, Norway suspended a $33 million donation to a Brazilian sustainability fund because Bolsonaro had interfered in it; Germany froze its payment five days earlier. Bolsonaro responded with mockery, telling the Europeans to go “reforest Germany” instead, but what may lie ahead is no laughing matter.

Under Siege

Bolsonaro has delivered on campaign promises to weaken protections for the environment and indigenous communities, freeing up more land for cattle. Over 870 sq. mi. of the Amazon was cleared in July–a 278% increase from July 2018–according to satellite monitoring by Brazil’s space-research agency. Scientists say the rain forest, which helps slow climate change by absorbing massive amounts of carbon dioxide, is nearing a “tipping point” after which its ecosystems cannot recover.

Gr..

The economic warning signs are flashing yellow. In Germany, the U.K., Italy, Brazil and Mexico, growth has stalled. In Japan, business confidence has turned negative for the first time since 2013. China’s industrial output is growing at its slowest pace in 17 years. An inverted yield curve has U.S. economists on recession watch.

But the real uncertainty is coming from the biggest surge in decades of the kind of political volatility that is relevant to markets. Politically motivated trade fights are under way between countries that make up half the global economy–from the U.S. and China, to the U.S. and Europe, to South Korea and Japan. The most worrisome of these economically damaging political fights is the ongoing trade war between Washington and Beijing, which shows no signs of easing. President Trump wants to avoid any appearance of a climbdown in this fight. So does China’s Xi Jinping, who must also signal strength in the growing confrontation with pro-democracy protesters in Hon..