Arafa to head Swiss WorldCargo

Longtime airline veteran Alexander Arafa has been appointed head of global area management at Swiss WorldCargo.    Alexander Arafa, currently head of cabin crew at SWISS, has been appointed head of global area management at Swiss WorldCargo. 
   He will take over this role on June 1, succeeding Ashwin Bhat, who became head of cargo last October. 
   Arafa started his airline career in Hamburg, Germany, 33 years ago as an accounting analyst with Northwest Airlines. He went on to hold sales positions with Olympic Airways and American Airlines, before joining Lufthansa in 1993 as its general manager for sales and distribution in the United States. Three years later he returned to Frankfurt to become Lufthansa’s vice president of sales strategy. 
   In late 1999, Arafa joined Swissair as head of sales in Europe. He was in charge of product development at SWISS from 2001 to 2005, and then served three years as vice president of sales in Europe before assuming his present position as head of cabin crew in 2008.