Sudanese expatriates vote in Chicago with assist by Bulls star

Luol Deng, Bulls Forward, Hopes Sudan Vote Brings Peace
Chicago — Chicago Bulls forward Luol Deng (LOO'-ul dehng) arrived to a hero's welcome at a polling place in Chicago where southern Sudanese are voting on their country's future. Deng drew cheers from fellow Sudanese on Sunday when he briefly draped himself with the Southern Sudan flag. The Basketball player has been encouraging people to vote for the Referendum on Southern Sudan independence and says a lot of people have fought for this day when Southern Sudanese would have a say in thei...

Much hope as Sudan's election starts
JUBA, Sudan, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- For four hours Sunday, Joseph Ladu shuffled along in a long line under a baking sun at Memorial Park, the central Polling Station in Southern Sudan's capital. Like the overwhelming majority of the some 4 million registered Southerners, he was eager to cast his vote for Secession from the Arab-dominated North and the creation of Africa's 53rd state. The atmosphere was filled with a euphoric cacophony. African hip-hop played from loudspeakers; women ululated; tribes d...

Neighbours fear division of Sudan may have domino effect
Southern Sudanese queue to vote at Wunrok town in Warrap State. Voting will last for one week. Photo: Kate Geraghty Johannesburg: If Southern Sudan, why not Southern Nigeria, or Northern Ivory Coast, or multiple Congos? The Sudanese vote has implications for all of Africa, signalling that the borders drawn by colonial cartographers are no longer sacrosanct. Some fear it may spur the Balkanisation of the continent. ''The Referendum in Sudan could have a Domino Effect,'' said Shehu Sani, president...

Sudanese refugees in the US vote on independence
CHICAGO (AP) - Thousands of jubilant Sudanese Refugees living in the United States turned polling places into victory parties Sunday with chanting, singing and flag-waving as they voted on a historic Referendum that could separate their homeland, Southern Sudan, from the north and create the world's newest country. In eight cities across the U.S., voters swarmed the makeshift polling places where the weeklong Elections were being held. In Chicago, Basketball star Luol Deng arrived at the offic...

64 killed in ethnic clashes in Sudan
JUBA, Sudan, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- At least 64 people have died in clashes in a disputed border area during southern Sudan's Secession vote, an offical said Monday. Deng Mading, acting head of the Abyei Referendum Forum, told Xinhua three days of fighting pitted police from the Dinka people against a Militia from the nomadic Misseriya tribe. About 40 Misseriya and 24 Dinka civilians were killed, he said, and more reports are coming in. The Dinka captured two U.N. peacekeepers' tanks from the Militia ...

The Referendum Hangover - By Maggie Fick
JUBA, Sudan—Euphoria permeated the atmosphere in the Southern Sudanese capital on Sunday, and for good reason. For a people who have fought and endured decades of conflict, all for the remote prospect of finding independence at the end, this week is for celebrating. A new state in the south seemed finally within reach when voting began in a weeklong Referendum on whether to secede from greater Sudan. Nearly 4 million Southern Sudanese are expected to cast ballots in what the region's leaders...

Vote turnout slows in southern Sudan
JUBA, Sudan, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- Voting slowed Monday on the second day of southern Sudan's independence Referendum, an official said. "As many people could not vote ... there is a proposal to extend the polling by an hour till 6 p.m.," Abuk Nikanora Manyok of the South Sudan Referendum Bureau told al-Jazeera. "Women are now going from house to house to mobilize those who have not voted to go out and vote," Manyok said. She said voting is slowly picking up in remote areas where people must walk f...

Avlon: Southern Sudan Celebrates Referendum Vote
John Avlon writes at The Daily Beast: After walking across Sudan during two decades of Civil War, 17 “Lost Boys” took a final step toward liberty on Sunday morning, joining their fellow Southern Sudanese in a long-awaited vote for independence. “After all of the struggle, loss of life, separation, and killing, we can see that we are now allowed to vote freely for our destiny,” Valentino Achak Deng told me in the southern capital city of Juba, along the banks of the Nile. Deng, the

Annan: Sudanese "excited about peace"
Voters in Southern Sudan have returned to Polling Stations for a second day in an independence Referendum which is widely expected to result in the birth of the world's newest state. Early turnout has not been as heavy as the first day of the week-long vote, but voters seem just as determined. The poll was agreed as part of the 2005 deal that ended a two-decade Civil War. The BBC's Andrew Harding spoke to former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan about the the Sudan referendum. Play Wh...

20 Police Die In Attack As Sudanese Go To Polls
Arab tribesmen accompanied by a northern Sudanese government-backed Militia killed 20 policemen in the disputed region of Abyei, a southern Military spokesman said Monday, raising concerns of violence as the south holds its independence Referendum. The attack came Sunday, the first day of voting in Southern Sudan's weeklong referendum, which is widely predicted to break Africa's largest country in two. Abyei, which straddles the north-south divide and holds oil deposits, had been promised its ow...

Huge turnout on second day of south Sudan vote
Stumble This! Thousands of south Sudanese poured out to vote for a second straight day in a landmark independence Referendum on Monday, bringing the region a step closer to becoming the world's newest state. Repeating the jubilant scenes witnessed on Sunday, huge queues formed outside Polling Stations in the regional capital Juba from long before dawn as voters seized the chance to have their say on whether to split Africa's largest nation and put the seal on five decades of north-south conflic...

Infidel Bloggers Alliance
Jubilant south Sudanese vote en masse in Referendum From Eye on the World: "We were the slaves of the Arabs... Today we are voting for our freedom." "This is the end of Arabisation, the end of Islamisation. (AFP) Villagers in southern Sudan voted on Sunday for what many saw as their freedom from "Slavery" in a referendum forecast to bring independence to their neglected region of central Africa. "We were the slaves of the Arabs... Today we are voting for our freedom," said Duku John, a square...

Sudanese Secession Wont Come Easy
Of all the bad ideas that colonialism left in Africa, Sudan was one of the worst. The historical relationship between the Arab Muslim north and the black, non-Muslim south always turned mainly on the slave trade—northeners enslaving southerners. (This was still going on when I reported on the Sudanese Civil War in the late nineteen-nineties.) The two regions never belonged in the same state. Now, after some fifty years of fighting, with more than two million lives lost, the largest country...

Chicago Bulls player hopes Sudan vote brings peace
Chicago Bulls forward Luol Deng (LOO'-ul dehng) arrived to a hero's welcome at a polling place in Chicago where southern Sudanese are voting on their country's future. Deng drew cheers from fellow Sudanese on Sunday when he briefly draped himself with the Southern Sudan flag. The Basketball player has been encouraging people to vote for the Referendum on Southern Sudan independence and says a lot of people have fought for this day when Southern Sudanese would have a say in their future. Deng is ...

Deadly new clashes on Sudan's north-south border highlight lack of oil deal
Fighting in Sudan's oil-rich border has killed as many as 33 people, raising tensions during a Secession Referendum and pointing to continued disputes over oil....

Israel or Palestine? The Jews Were There First
There is a powerful oped in Israel’s Ynet news that puts things in proper perspective.  The Jewish people have a historic homeland in Israel.  They were there in any organized Fashion before the Islamists ever showed up.  Be sure to read the whole thing.  An excerpt: “The claim of national Sovereignty and the level of steadfastness in face of adversity are Derivatives of the attachment to the territorial cradle of history and National Security requirements. Nation...

White House Africa moves
With the Obama Administration expressing tentative relief that voting in South Sudan’s Referendum on Secession has proceeded relatively smoothly so far, it is giving kudos to the top White House Africa advisor who has helped manage and keep the administration on top of the potentially hugely volatile issue to date. But now, officials say, National Security Council senior director for Africa Michelle Gavin is planning to leave the White House later this month, despite heartfelt regrets e...

The Bad Borders Meme (guest post by James Fearon)
Below is a guest post by James Fearon, the Theodore and Frances Geballe Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences at Stanford University. As many of you know, Jim is one of the most influential scholars in the field of international relations. His work in the past decade or so has focussed on interethnic cooperation and Civil War. He may occasionally offer his thoughts on these pages when the mood strikes (which we hope is often). The text below is Jim's. In general I think Jeffrey Ge...

Sudan: Violence mars peaceful independence vote
AT LEAST 30 people have been killed in violence in the Abyei region, on Sudan's north-south divide, officials said yesterday. Observers fear the unrest could spark more fighting amid an otherwise peaceful independence Referendum in the south. Abyei remains the most contentious sticking point between north and south following a two-decade Civil War. Oil-rich Abyei had ADVERTISEMENT been promised its own self-determination vote, but now whether it remains part of Sudan or joins an independent s...

Sudanese president: "Sharia law has always stipulated that one must whip, cut, or kill"
He said it. Is Omar al-Bashir some kind of Islamophobe? No, he is looking forward to using the outcome of southern Sudan's independence Referendum to ramp up Sharia law within the remainder of the country. Religious Minorities in the north are rightfully afraid (along with all Minorities who will be further marginalized under Bashir's intended campaign of cultural Arabization), given the subjugated status Islamic law prescribes for them (Qur'an 9:29). The entire population can look forward to ...

Deadly clashes on Sudan's North-South line
At least 36 people died in clashes between indigenous tribes and Arab nomads near Sudan's North-South border, leaders in the contested Abyei region said yesterday, on the second day of a vote on independence for the South of the country. Abyei remains the most contentious sticking point between north and south following a two-decade Civil War that left 2 million dead. Even President Barack Obama, who applauded this week's historic Referendum on independence in the south, warned that violence in...

20 Policemen Killed in Arab Tribe Attack
Jan. 9, 2011: A southern Sudanese Police Officer on security detail outside a Polling Station in the southern Sudanese capital of Juba. Women broke out in song and men wrapped themselves in flags as voters in Southern Sudan began casting ballots Sunday in a weeklong independence Referendum likely to create the world's newest nation about five years after the end of a brutal Civil War. The mainly Christian south is widely expected to secede from the mainly Muslim north, splitting Africa's lar...

Picture This: An Eye on Independence
When the polling precincts opened at 8 a.m. on Sunday, long lines had already formed outside. Here, Sudanese in the city of Juba can be seen waiting to cast their votes. On Sunday, the people of southern Sudan began voting on an independence Referendum following a historic 2005 peace treaty that brought to an end decades of Civil War between the Arab north and predominantly Christian and animist south in Africa's longest-ever civil conflict. More than 2 million people died in the conflict betw...

Not all Good News From South Sudan
The man the International Criminal Court acuses of having facilitated the Darfur Genocide by plying arms to Militias allied with the Sudanese government may be doing the same thing in the Abyei region. As Southern Sudanese took to the polls in an independence Referendum yesterday, violence broke out in the restive Abyei region — a disputed region between the central government in Khartoum and the South.  Several dozen people were killed, but what exactly happened depends ver...

South Sudan eyes basketball as new national pride
Southern Sudanese Basketball players train in Bentiu. If there is one thing... Southern Sudanese Basketball players train in Bentiu. If there is one thing... If there is one thing south Sudan is famous for in the outside world, it is the super lofty stars with which it has studded the NBA. Now, as nationhood beckons, it is Basketball that it is looking to to make a name in international sports. No sporting official in south Sudan is in any doubt that the week-long independence Referendum which ...