(News Brief) Bashir Accepts South Sudan's Secession Vote

Bashir, HUMNEWS file photo(HN, February 7, 2011) Sudan’s president Omar al-Bashir says he is backing the results from Southern Sudan’s freedom referendum that have indicated a landslide vote for independence.

Bashir said he wanted to be the first to congratulate the south on their new state and said Sudan would aid the south in any way possible.

Final results of the votes are expected later today – the voting took place last month and preliminary results indicate that 98 percent of ballots were cast for independence, in favor of dividing Africa’s biggest country.

Southern Sudan will be Africa’s newest country, officially in July of this year.

There have been tensions between the two sides for several decades.  A war that lasted over two decades between Northern and Southern Sudan ended in 2005 leaving 2 million dead.

It remains to be seen how tensions between the two will work out - the two will remain economically dependent on one another as Southern Sudan cannot export its oil resources without using a pipeline that runs though the northern territory.

- HUMNEWS Staff