Radisson Hotel Group continues its ambitious growth in Africa with the signing of seven new hotels, adding over 1,400 rooms to its African portfolio. The new hotels expand the Group’s brands, spanning from upscale to premium luxury lifestyle with a new market entry in Gambia and the introduction of new brands in key markets with the first Radisson Collection in Nigeria and Egypt, the first Radisson RED hotel in Nigeria, and the introduction of the Radisson brand in Kenya.
As one of the fastest-growing hotel companies in Africa, Radisson Hotel Group plans to further strengthen its robust African presence this year beyond signings with at least seven hotel openings and over 1,400 rooms. These openings include the Group’s first hotel openings in Reunion Island and Ghana and expanding its resort presence in Casablanca and Saidia in Morocco as well as in South Africa, Egypt and Tunisia.

Somalia’s South West State was the latest stop for the recently-appointed top United Nations official for Somalia, who today met that Federal Member State’s (FMS) leadership for a wide-ranging exchange on collaboration and support.
“We’ve had a very good conversation, including with key members of his cabinet. We started by talking about the ongoing serious humanitarian situation here in South West State – a part of the country that used to be the breadbasket of Somalia, I hear – but now is one of the most vulnerable due to these repeated droughts,” said the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Somalia, Catriona Laing.
The UN official made the remarks at a joint media encounter with South West States’ President Abdiaziz Hassan Mohamed ‘Laftagareen,’ after an earlier meeting with him and members of his administration.
In her remarks, Ms. Laing added that she and the FMS leader also gave particular focus to one aspect of the humanitarian crisis in South West State, that of internally displaced people (IDPs) – with Somalia’s ongoing drought affecting livelihoods, many IDPs are now seeking aid and new opportunities in urban centres like Baidoa.

The United States Agency for International Development/Ethiopia (USAID) Acting Mission Director Timothy Stein was joined by Minister of Health Dr. Lia Tadesse and Commissioner for Ethiopian Disaster Risk Management Commission Dr. Shiferaw Teklemariam to launch the USAID Health Resilience Activity. This five-year, $12 million (650 million Birr) project will empower the Ministry of Health to anticipate, prepare for, detect, respond to, and mitigate the impact of public health emergencies in Ethiopia. The collaboration between USAID and the Ministry of Health will lead to improved preparedness to effectively respond to public health emergencies at the sub regional level.
The launch, held at the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) National Training Center, was attended by representatives from regional health bureaus, regional public health institutes, UN agencies and other development partners, who highlighted the need for community-level health system strengthening. During his remarks, Acting Mission Director Stein noted, “The coordination of all development partners in the Public Health Emergency Management space is paramount to achieving these goals of the project.”
The project will provide leadership development and training on data use for early warning, preparedness, and response planning. Concurrent trainings will focus on mobilizing local resources for times of emergency.

Hundreds of migrant workers hired as security guards for last year’s World Cup are still being denied justice for the abuses they suffered despite FIFA and the hosts Qatar being warned that they were especially vulnerable to exploitation and workers raising complaints and protesting about their treatment.
An investigation has found serious labour abuses occurred at the World Cup and were not properly addressed, even though Amnesty International issued a 70-page report in April 2022, which sounded the alarm about systematic and structural labour abuses across the private security sector in Qatar.
“The World Cup organizers were well aware of the issues but failed to put in place adequate measures to protect workers and prevent predictable labour abuses at World Cup sites, even after workers raised these issues directly,” said Steve Cockburn, Amnesty International’s Head of Economic and Social Justice.