Word: south
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...much of the international community to support the questionable election is a return to war in Africa's largest country. Already, the crisis in Darfur has claimed some 300,000 lives, while 2 million have died in a half-century of civil war between Sudan's north and south. Those numbers may have persuaded the international community to subordinate democracy to the cause of peace, but a slew of opposition groups withdrew from the presidential election ahead of the poll - citing repression and the expectation of vote-rigging - leaving no serious challengers to the incumbent, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir...
...Holding the election was required by the U.S.-brokered 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which ended the second of two long civil wars between the country's north and south. That conflict was the longest running of several between the Arab, Islamist government in Khartoum, which has lavished resources on itself and its capital city, and separatist groups across Sudan's periphery, which have been marginalized for decades. (See how the election can spark peace in Darfur...
...peace deal's grand finale is to come in January 2011, when the south will hold a referendum on full independence. Southern secession is a painful prospect for the north, not only because of the loss of territory, but because most of Sudan's oil output is pumped in the south. So, to its backers, this week's election represents a vital first step on what promises to be a fraught road. "Without this election, there is no way to go forward to the referendum and the culmination of the peace agreement," former U.S. President Jimmy Carter told TIME while...
...Some caution that expecting perfect elections is unrealistic in a country so precipitously balanced between war and peace. Neha Erasmus, the South Sudan coordinator for the advocacy group Justice Africa, says the decision to pull Arman from the race was a good one. By not contesting the presidential vote, she says, the SPLM refuses to endorse a flawed process but also avoids destabilizing relations with its partner in peace. (See "Omar al-Bashir: Sudan's Wanted...
...choice did not always play well on South Sudan's streets. "Many people in the south wanted to vote for Yasir," says Moses Duku, a Juba motorbike taxi driver. "Who are we to vote for now?" But with prospects dimming for the realization of the CPA's vision of a new, united Sudan, many in the south are looking to the peace deal's final exit clause. "It's clearly mentioned in the CPA that you need the elections to happen," says Edmin Baba after casting his first ever vote. But, he adds, "the referendum, of course, for every southerner...