South will likely secede

The U.S. special envoy to Sudan spoke Tuesday about the challenges facing the war-torn country as it prepares for a referendum that likely will result in the secession of [heavily Christian] South Sudan from the Arab-dominated north.

"We have less than six months until the referendum," Scott Gration said at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "We have less than a year until we could, likely, have a new country in Africa — a new country as part of the United Nations."

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