Sudan

APTOPIX Southern Suda_Thir.jpg

South Sudanese men wait to casts their vote at a polling station in Juba, Southern Sudan, Monday, Jan 10, 2011. Thousands of people began casting ballots Sunday during a weeklong vote to choose the destiny of this war-ravaged and desperately poor but oil-rich region. The mainly Christian south is widely expected to secede from the mainly Muslim north, splitting Africa's largest country in two.(AP Photo/Jerome Delay)

20110109-215719-pic-110419668.jpg

Salva Kiir, president of the semiautonomous government of Southern Sudan, casts his vote in front of a cheering crowd of hundreds of Sudanese voters in Juba on Sunday. (Associated Press)

20110109-182417-pic-13229574.jpg

Salva Kiir, president of the semiautonomous government of Southern Sudan, casts his vote in front of a cheering crowd of hundreds of Sudanese voters in Juba on Sunday. About 4 million southern Sudanese voters began casting their ballots Sunday in a weeklong referendum on independence that is expected to split Africa's largest nation in two. (Associated Press)

Southern Sudan Refere_Lea(3).jpg

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter (right) greets Southern Sudanese men waiting to cast their vote at a polling station in Juba, Southern Sudan, on Sunday, Jan 9, 2011. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay)

Southern Sudan Refere_Lea.jpg

Southern Sudanese women wait to cast their votes at a polling station in the small rural village of Peiti, Southern Sudan, on Sunday Jan 9, 2011. About four million Southern Sudanese voters began casting their ballots Sunday in a weeklong referendum on independence that is expected to split Africa's largest nation in two. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay)

SUDAN.jpg

Southern Sudanese take part in a pro-separation rally in the southern capital of Juba on Friday, Jan. 7, 2011. Thousands of pro-independence supporters rallied throughout the town just two days before voting commences in a referendum that will determine if southern Sudan secedes from the north to form the world's newest country. (AP Photo/Pete Muller)

Sudan_Referendum.jpg

Citizens unloaded voting material at Tali, in southern Sudan, earlier this week. Referendum voting begins Sunday to determine whether south Sudan should remain part of the country or to break away from the north. (Associated Press)

South Sudan Bashir_Lea.jpg

Pro-separation activists hold signs and chant pro-independence slogans outside the Juba airport in Southern Sudan, where Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir arrived on Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2011. Southerners will commence voting in an independence referendum on Sunday, the outcome of which will determine whether the south secedes to form the world's newest country. (AP Photo/Pete Muller)

20101229-200603-pic-115066033.jpg

Southern Sudanese security forces wait outside the control room of the Petrodar oil facility in Paloich, southern Sudan. Sudan's oil industry may soon see a major shake-up. Southern Sudan holds an independence referendum in January that is likely to see the creation of the world's newest country. (Associated Press)

Sudan_Carter_Last_Worm.sff.jpg

In this Nov. 4, 2010 photo, Moses Bec, Carter Center field officer, uses a flip chart to explain to residents of Rakaweng cattle camp in Sudan how to prevent contracting guinea worm. He is holding a soiled and unusable water filter which was found by Carter Center staff on the ground in the cattle camp. The Carter Center distributes simple tools like cloth filters to local communities in remote Awerial County, in Lakes State, Southern Sudan, to encourage people to drink clean water instead of drinking directly from ponds contaminated with guinea worm. Cattle keeping communities in places like Awerial County, however, are sometimes resistant to using these devices, so the Carter Center conducts frequent health education sessions in the cattle camps in order to encourage regular use of the filtering devices. (AP Photo/Maggie Fick)

20101215-190052-pic-315534847.jpg

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOGRAPHS Southern army officers in Northern Bahr el Ghazal state in Sudan on Saturday peer into a bomb crater created from one of the bombs dropped by the northern Sudanese army on a southern army base in the disputed border zone of Kiir Adem, where southern Sudan meets Darfur. The northern Sudanese army has launched a series of aerial bombardments in this disputed zone over the past month, and the southern army says it will not respond to these provocations in order to protect the rights of southern Sudanese to participate peacefully in their January independence referendum.

20101205-202813-pic-715496107.jpg

Sen. Richard G. Lugar, Indiana Republican, says Democrats should limit the lame-duck session to tax legislation, a broad spending measure and a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia. If Republicans get that assurance, he says, the treaty could pass with "strong bipartisan support." (Associated Press)

20101115-163405-pic-734304008.jpg

Ajak Dau Akech (left) and Kuol Awan, executive director of the Arizona Lost Boys Center - both are Sudanese war orphans and part of the group known as the Lost Boys of Sudan - look through refugee identification document packages to be mailed to Lost Boys around the world.