Upgraded Outlook

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Diplomats like to remain neutral but Nanaia Mahuta let the veil slip a little when a winner was declared in the U.S. election by tweeting a smiley-face emoji.Mahuta, the first indigenous Maori woman to be appointed New Zealand’s foreign affairs minister, suppresses a real-life smile when asked about it. “Look, what I can say is that there were encouraging signs in those speeches,” she said in an interview with the The Associated Press. She said the victory speech by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris was “inspirational to many women around the world.”Mahuta, 50, was a surprise pick for the role, despite being a respected performer in Parliament for almost half her life, since she was first elected in 1996 at age 26. She is part of the most diverse group of lawmakers ever appointed to the top roles in Cabinet after Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern won a second term in a landslide victory last month.Mahuta said she felt joyous at being chosen and promised to bring a new perspective to foreign affairs.She didn’t have to wait long for her first contentious moment. New Zealand has long been cautious of criticizing China, its largest trading partner. But Mahuta last week took the step of joining Australia, Canada, the U.K. and the U.S. in condemning China for imposing new rules to disqualify legislators in Hong Kong.China reacted with anger.“Be careful not to get poked in the eye,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said in response, referring to the “Five Eyes” military alliance among the five countries.Mahuta said she had talked with Ardern before deciding to sign the statement and felt it was a natural progression to “turn the dial up” and join with other countries. She said she thinks the relationship with China is mature enough to withstand such disagreements.Still, it will pose a challenge for Mahuta to find the right balance to strike with an increasingly assertive China and a combative U.S. For now, Mahuta said she intends to focus on building relationships with New Zealand’s immediate island neighbors in the Pacific, even if the coronavirus prevents her traveling there in person.“This could be the period of the Zoom diplomacy,” she said. People around the world have been curious about Mahuta’s moko kauae, or sacred facial tattoo, which she got four years ago to celebrate her heritage, ancestors and connection to Papatuanuku, or Mother Earth.“The most common question is, did it hurt?” she laughs.The answer? Not really, because her mind went to a different place.She said wearing the moko makes her more mindful “in how you want to be as a person, how you treat other people. So that it’s almost like a compass.”Thirty years ago, before there was a revival of Maori culture in New Zealand, facial tattoos tended to be associated with gang members. Mahuta said she still finds negative reactions to hers in some parts of the country, but these days most people recognize it as an affirmation of culture.Mahuta is the daughter of the late Sir Robert Mahuta, a key figure in the Tainui tribe who helped settle a groundbreaking financial claim with the government for land that was taken during colonization.Mahuta said her father was her mentor and a tough taskmaster. But it was the students she met as a university tutor who convinced her to go into politics, not her dad.“I think if he had his way, I wouldn’t be in politics, I’d be in the tribe,” she said.Lara Greaves, a lecturer in politics at the University of Auckland, said Mahuta is well prepared for her role because she has spent her whole life steeped in high-level cultural diplomacy in Maori society.“I think it’s a really positive move,” Greaves said.She said the surprise at Mahuta’s appointment -- her own included — likely reflected the dominance that men still have internationally in foreign affairs.Mahuta said she’d like to see more women involved.“I’m a part of a very small group of women who have now reached out and linked arms to say, well, there’s is a lot that we can do together,” she said.In her office, Mahuta points out various artifacts that have meaning for her — the baskets of knowledge from the Pacific, the pictures of the prime minister who invited her ancestor into Parliament. And then she gets to the Silvanian Families village in the corner.“I have a 7-year-old daughter who’s made part of this office hers,” Mahuta said. “One of the things I’ve learned when I’ve been in Parliament is to make it family friendly.”New ZealandForeign AffairsForeign MinistryMilitary AllianceOutlookHong KongAustraliaChinaWorld AffairsAPThe The Associated PressParliamentCabinetChineseTainuiNanaia MahutaKamala HarrisJacinda ArdernZhao Lijian

(RTTNews) - Australia's leading index improved in September suggesting that momentum continued to show a significant improvement consistent with the economy moving out of recession, data from Westpac showed Wednesday. The six-month annualized growth rate in the Westpac Melbourne Institute Leading Index, which indicates the likely pace of economic activity...AustraliaConsumer Confidence IndexSignalMomentumEconomicsEconomic OutlookConsumer DemandConsumer PricesEconomic ActivityConsumer ExpectationsS&P / ASXCommodity PricesTrendKey FactorsBusiness InvestmentBill EvansRead Full Story

New York (CNN Business) — Microsoft 365 was hit with a significant outage late Monday that affected users' access to multiple services, including Outlook. By late evening, services appeared to be largely restored: Micr

Inger Andersen is UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP) The goal of the plan, and its Aichi Biodiversity Targets, was to halt biodiversity loss and ensure that ecosystems cont

World leaders have failed to meet a set of important biodiversity goals, meaning ecosystems are still experiencing severe difficulties as a consequence, according to a United Nations report. In fact, not one single biodi

The Great Barrier Reef is now in “critical” condition and the health of four other Australian World Heritage properties has worsened, according to a sobering report just released by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The IUCN is the global authority on nature. Its third outlook report marks...Read Full Story Great NewsThe Great Barrier ReefCoral BleachingUS MarineNatural HabitatInvasive SpeciesUNESCOWorld Heritage CommitteeIUCN OutlookClimate2019 Outlook ReportGondwana RainforestsUN Climate FrameworkCosmosShark BayChristiana Figueres

The Federal Reserve said during its final meeting of the year on Wednesday that it would continue holding interest rates near zero and underscored its promise to aid the economy's recovery from the coronavirus pandemic, but painted a brighter outlook for 2021. The U.S. central bank, as widely expected, held...Read Full StoryReal GdpEmergency AidMarket RatesU.S. Interest RatesEconomyEconomic OutlookUnemployment RatesThe Federal ReserveCongressFed OfficialsPolicymakersReal GDPCentral BankPrice Stability GoalsOptimism

Join the Global Landscapes Forum’s digital conference on biodiversity 28–29 October. The Earth’s biodiversity – the entire range of life on Earth – is “suffering badly and getting worse” warned the United N

(Reuters) - The New York Times NYT.N warned on Thursday its robust digital growth may not be sustainable going ahead, easing expectations after reporting a strong quarter that benefited from a news coverage storm around the COVID-19 pandemic and the U.S. election.The company’s shares fell 5% on the sobering outlook, even as it achieved the key milestone of generating more revenue from digital sign-ups than print subscriptions.“2020 is an outlier year. So I don’t think you should expect us to get to the same place we are getting in 2020 given the extraordinary nature of the news cycle,” Chief Executive Officer Meredith Kopit Levien said on an earnings call with analysts.Heightened interest in the U.S. presidential election brought 120 million readers to its digital platform on Wednesday alone and over 75 million the day before, Kopit Levien added.New York Times said it added 393,000 paid digital-only subscribers during the quarter. Of this, 275,000 subscribed for its digital news product, while the remaining were for its popular cooking, games and audio products.The paper has focused for years on online subscriptions to offset an industry-wide decline in print readership and fickle advertising revenues.The media company warned of a 30% decline in advertising revenue in the fourth quarter, but said it expects digital-only subscription revenue to rise about 35%.New York Times competes with tech giants like Facebook Inc FB.O and Alphabet Inc's GOOGL.O Google as well as other national news publishers to attract advertisers.Total revenue slipped 0.4% to $426.9 million, but came in above analysts’ estimates of $411.8 million, according to Refinitiv data.Excluding items, the company earned 22 cents per share, beating analysts’ average estimate of 11 cents.Reporting by Ayanti Bera and Tiyashi Datta in Bengaluru; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu and Saumyadeb ChakrabartyNewsBig TechThe New York TimesChief Executive OfficerBangaloreOutlookStrong EarningsAverage EarningsGoogle EarningsDigital StormFacebook IncReutersAlphabet IncNew York Times NYT.NAyanti BeraMeredith Kopit Levien

The Federal Reserve’s policymaking committee estimates that the overall economic blow of the coronavirus pandemic will be smaller than it had expected in September, according to new projections released Wednesday. Members of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which sets Fed interest rates and other monetary policy tools, upgraded their...Read Full StoryGross Domestic ProductFederal ReserveUnemployment RateFed OfficialsGrowth RatesMarket RatesU.S. Interest RatesThe Federal Reserve 'sAfrican AmericansHispanicsDemocraticRepublicanFed Interest RatesFOMC MembersOutlookJerome Powell