Northern Huvadhu Atoll or Gaafu Alifu is an administrative division of the Maldives created on February 8, 1962 when Huvadhu Atoll was divided into two districts. Gaafu Alifu corresponds to the northeastern section of this large natural atoll north of the line extending between the channels of Footukandu and Vaarulu Kandu. The capital of this district is Vilingili.

NOTE: Haa Alifu, Haa Dhaalu, Shaviyani, Noonu, Raa, Baa, Kaafu, etc. (including Gaafu Alif) are code letters assigned to the present administrative divisions of the Maldives. They are not the proper names of the natural atolls that make up these divisions. Some atolls are divided into two administrative divisions while other divisions are made up of two or more natural atolls. The order followed by the code letters is from North to South, beginning with the first letters of the Thaana alphabet used in Dhivehi. These code letters are not accurate from the geographical and cultural point of view. However, they have become popular among tourists and foreigners in the Maldives who find them easier to pronounce than the true atoll names in Dhivehi, (save a few exceptions, like Ari Atoll).

Sister Marie Keyrouz (also spelled "Kairouz") (b. 1963) is a chanter of Oriental Church music, a member of the Congrégation des Soeurs Basiliennes Chouérites and founder-president of the National Institute of Sacred Music in Paris.

She was born in Deir el Ahmar in Lebanon, close to the ancient Roman city of Baalbeck. Raised in the Maronite Church, but being a Melkite through her religious congregation, she took her vows in the Melkite Greek Catholic Church. From an early age, she undertook several disciplines of study simultaneously, earning a joint doctorate in musicology and anthropology from the Sorbonne in 1991. She has collected a variety of "Oriental" Christian chants, mostly preserved in Greek, Syriac, and Arabic manuscripts and through oral tradition.

Her debut album Chant byzantin took Europe by surprise upon its arrival in 1989, not only with the apparently ancient repertoire it represents, but also due to her own virtuosity, having a great ability to sing the intervals in rapid flourishes, notes that are difficult for most singers to reproduce. Her repertoire ranges from the Classical Arabic vocal music to western Classical operatic soprano.