AFRICA FOCUS

UN; Senegal opens new regional headquarters to house 34 agencies

Published

1 year ago

November 24, 2023

A general view of the new United Nations (UN) regional headquarters in Diamniadio on November 22, 2023. – Built on a 13 hectare site, it will eventually be able to accommodate more than 3000 staff and 2000 officials and visitors and to accommodate 34 United Nations agencies present in Senegal. (Photo by Seyllou / AFP)

AFP

Senegalese President Macky Sall on Thursday inaugurated a United Nations regional headquarters near the capital Dakar to house all UN operations in the country, AFP journalists reported.

The United Nations House sits on a 13-hectare (32-acre) site in the new town of Diamniadio, some 30 kilometers (18 miles) from Dakar, and will also be dedicated to the wider region of West and Central Africa.

The complex will house the 34 UN entities currently based in Senegal and their 2,400 employees, the organizers of the inauguration ceremony said.

Work began on the project — built by a private Senegalese company — in 2019 with a cost of 175 billion CFA francs ($291 million).

“We wanted to offer the 34 United Nations agencies based” in Senegal, especially in Dakar, “an ideal and appropriate setting to facilitate their work”, Sall said at the ceremony.

“It is the mark of our country’s renewed attention to the United Nations, to contribute to the ideal of peace and the aspiration of peoples to work together for a better world,” he added.

The new town of Diamniadio was launched eight years ago by Sall to relieve traffic congestion in Dakar.