Independent South Sudan "free at last" - Reuters

A man dances with fireworks during South Sudan's independence day celebrations in Juba July 9, 2011.

Credit: Reuters/Goran Tomasevic

By Alexander Dziadosz and Jeremy Clarke

JUBA | Sun Jul 10, 2011 11:25am EDT

JUBA (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of South Sudanese danced and cheered as their new nation declared independence on Saturday, a hard-won separation from the north that still leaves simmering issues of disputed borders and oil payments unresolved.

The president of South Sudan, Salva Kiir, stood next to his old civil war foe the president of Sudan, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who now leads just the north, at a ceremony to mark the birth of the new nation.

Under-developed, oil-producing South Sudan won its independence in a January referendum -- the climax of a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of fighting with the north.

Security forces at first tried to control the streets in the south's dusty capital Juba, but retreated as jubilant crowds moved in overnight and through the day, waving flags, dancing and chanting "South Sudan o-yei, freedom o-yei."

Some revelers fainted in the blistering heat as South Sudan's parliamentary speaker, James Wani Igga, read out the formal declaration of independence.

"We, the democratically elected representatives of the people ... hereby declare Southern Sudan to be an independent and sovereign state," said Igga before Sudan's flag was lowered, the South Sudan flag was raised and the new anthem sung. Kiir took the oath of office.

People threw their hands in the air, embraced and wept. "We got it. We got it," one man said as he hugged a woman.

The presence of Bashir, who campaigned to keep Africa's largest state united, was a key gesture of goodwill.

It will also be an embarrassment to some Western diplomats at the event. The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Bashir on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

Bashir gave a speech congratulating the new country. "The will of the people of the south has to be respected," he said, adding that both states had to maintain peace.

RECOGNITION

North Sudan's government was the first to recognize South Sudan on Friday, hours before the split took place, a move that smoothed the way to the division.

The United States, China and Britain signaled their recognition of the state on Saturday, according to official statements and government media reports.

"After so much struggle by the people of South Sudan, the United States of America welcomes the birth of a new nation," said U.S. President Barack Obama, stopping short of announcing any immediate changes in longstanding U.S. sanctions on Sudan that Khartoum has been hoping will be lifted.

Dignitaries including U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the leaders of about 30 African nations attended.

In a possible sign of the South's new allegiances, the crowd included about 200 supporters of Darfur rebel leader Abdel Wahed al-Nur, fighting Khartoum in an eight-year insurgency just over South Sudan's border in the north.

Earlier, the supporters of Nur's rebel Sudan Liberation Army faction stood in a line chanting "Welcome, welcome new state," wearing T-shirts bearing their leader's image. One carried a banner reading "El Bashir is wanted dead or alive."

Traditional dance groups drummed and waved shields and staffs in a carnival atmosphere.

"Free at last," said Simon Agany, 34, as he walked around shaking hands after midnight -- the time when officials said the South actually became the world's newest nation.

The crowd cheered as Kiir unveiled a giant statue of civil war hero John Garang, who signed the peace deal with the north.

Kiir offered an amnesty to rebels fighting his government and promised to bring peace to troubled border areas.

"I would like to take this opportunity to declare amnesty for all those who have taken up arms against Sudan," he said.

"I want to assure the people of Abyei, Darfur, Blue Nile and South Kordofan that we have not forgotten you. When you cry, we cry. When you bleed, we bleed. I pledge to you today that we will find a just peace for all," he said.

SEEDS OF FUTURE TENSION

Khartoum's recognition of the South did not dispel fears of future tensions.

Northern and southern leaders have still not agreed on a list of issues, most importantly the line of the border, the ownership of the disputed Abyei region and how they will handle oil revenues, the lifeblood of both economies.

At the stroke of midnight the Republic of Sudan lost almost a third of its territory and about three quarters of its oil reserves, which are sited in the south. It faced the future with insurgencies in its Darfur and Southern Kordofan regions.

In Khartoum on Saturday, one sign of the new national order was the disappearance of some English-language and SPLM-linked newspapers. The north said it suspended them on Friday as they were published or owned by southerners -- an ominous signal for more than 1 million southerners left in the north.

Many northerners see the separation as a loss of face.

Analysts have long feared a return to war if north-south disputes are not resolved.

Mostly Muslim Sudan fought rebels in the south, where most follow Christianity and traditional beliefs, for all but a few years from the 1950s in civil wars fueled by ethnicity, religion, oil and ideology.

(Additional reporting by Ulf Laessing, Andrew Heavens and Khaled Abdelaziz in Khartoum and Megan Davies at the United Nations; Writing by Andrew Heavens; Editing by Tim Pearce)

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US Sweetens Offer to Take Sudan Off Terrorist State List - New York Times

WASHINGTON — President Obama has told Sudan that if it allows a politically sensitive referendum to go ahead in January, and abides by the results, the United States will move to take the country off its list of state sponsors of terrorism as early as next July, administration officials said Sunday.

The offer, conveyed to the Sudanese authorities over the weekend by Senator John Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, represents a significant sweetening of the package of incentives the administration offered to Sudan in September for its cooperation with the vote.

Under a peace agreement that ended years of civil war in Sudan, the government in Khartoum agreed to a referendum, now scheduled for Jan. 9, in which the people of southern Sudan will decide whether to secede from the north. They are expected to vote overwhelmingly to do so.

But as the date for the vote nears, there are persistent reports of foot-dragging by the Sudanese authorities in preparing for it, as well as fears of a new outbreak of violence if the north does not honor the results. Dividing Sudan is hugely complicated, since most of its oil fields lie in the south.

In September, the administration presented Sudan with incentives ranging from modest steps like the delivery of agricultural equipment to more sweeping measures, including debt relief, normalized diplomatic relations, the lifting of sanctions and the removal of Sudan from the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism, which it has been on since 1993.

Administration officials said then that they did not expect to take that last step until late 2011 or 2012, one official said, because it was also linked to a resolution of the violence in the Darfur region. But now the United States has made it contingent only on the referendum. The Sudanese government, another official said, had pushed in recent weeks for more clarity in the incentives.

“I believe a broad agreement is within reach if they act with the sense of urgency that is necessary to seize this historic opportunity,” Mr. Kerry said in a statement on Sunday as he left Sudan.

Sudan has long petitioned to be removed from the State Department list, which also includes Iran, Cuba and Syria. Under President Bill Clinton, the administration designated its placement there on the grounds that it harbored Osama bin Laden and other terrorists. But in recent years, Sudan has cooperated in counterterrorism efforts.

Over time, Sudan’s designation has been expanded to include its role in mass killings in Darfur. Economic sanctions against Sudan remain linked to the violence in Darfur, officials said, and cannot be lifted without approval from Congress. Earlier this week, Mr. Obama renewed those sanctions. The president can remove Sudan from the terrorism list after notifying Congress.

The United States, an official said, will not relax “our commitment to solving the problems that have dogged Darfur.”

The administration’s offer does not depend on resolving another sticking point: a separate plebiscite by people in the contested border region of Abyei to decide to join northern or southern Sudan. The two sides have not agreed on the terms of that vote, also scheduled for January.

With diplomats still struggling to break the impasse, administration officials said they recognized that the plebiscite on Abyei may have to be deferred until after the broader vote on independence by southern Sudan.

North Korea was the last nation the United States removed from the terrorism list. That was done by the Bush administration in 2008, in an effort to encourage Pyongyang to be more pliant in talks over its nuclear program — a goal that has been largely unmet, given North Korea’s recent intransigence.

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