An Icelandic lawmaker delivered a speech to colleagues in parliament on Wednesday while breastfeeding her six-month-old daughter.
Unnur Bra Konradsdottir, MP for Iceland’s Independence Party, took the podium to explain a vote on an immigration project, and breastfed her baby while she spoke.
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“She was hungry and I had not expected to go to the pulpit,” Konradsdottir explained to Euronews. “So I either had to tear the baby girl off me and leave her crying with the MP sitting next to me or just take her with me and I thought it would cause less disturbance to take her with me.”
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Icelanders are generally very accepting of breastfeeding in public, but it is the first time an MP has breastfed while addressing parliament.
The public display is just the latest in Iceland’s long history of feminist events that has regularly made it the best place in the world for women to live.
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Vigdis Finnbogadottir, a single mother, became the first woman to be democratically as a head of state in 1980.
According to Konradsdottir, she’s brought her young daughter to work on several occasions.
“She has been with me at the Parliament almost since she was born so my fellow MPs are used to her,” she said. “Usually she is very calm and when we cast our votes she is sound asleep. So there have never been any incidents before.”
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