Culture

A new Commonwealth e-learning course launched on Tuesday 11th December 2023 will improve the ability of small and other vulnerable states to access billions of dollars in climate finance.

The Commonwealth Secretary-General, The Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC, launched the ‘commonwealth climate finance Essential E-learning Course’at an event in Dubai during the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28).

The course builds on the extensive experience of the commonwealth climate Finance Access Hub. The hub has helped 17 small and vulnerable states in Africa, the Caribbean, and the Pacific to access more than US$322 million in climate finance for projects to mitigate and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

Burundi has become the 100th country to implement FIFA’s Football for schools programme in a ceremony held in a celebratory atmosphere at the Urunani Stadium in Buganda, outside Bujumbura, and attended by FIFA President Gianni Infantino. The ceremony took place in the presence of the Burundi Minister of East African Community Affairs, Youth, Sports and Culture, Gervais Abayeho, and the President of the Football Federation of Burundi, Alexandre Muyenge.

“Thanks to this wonderful Football for Schools project, FIFA and Burundi are uniting the world. We’re uniting the world with a football project, with an education project, with a project that gives chances and opportunities to the youth, to the boys and girls of this wonderful country, Burundi,” the FIFA President told the crowd.

A transgender woman has won the Miss Portugal beauty pageant for the first time and will compete with another transgender woman for the Miss Universe title in El Salvador, Portuguese media reported.

Marina Machete, a 28-year-old trans woman  has won the Miss Portugal beauty pageant in Évora and will now compete with another trans woman for the title Miss Universe, to be held in El Salvador in November.

“Proud to be the first trans woman to compete for the title of Miss Universe Portugal,” she wrote on social media before winning the title.