Independent South Sudan "free at last" (Reuters)

JUBA (Reuters) ? Tens of thousands of South Sudanese danced and cheered as their new country formally declared its independence on Saturday, a hard-won separation from the north that also plunged the fractured region into a new period of uncertainty.

The President of South Sudan Salva Kiir stood next to his old civil war foe the President of Sudan Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who now leads just the north, at a ceremony to mark the birth of the new nation.

The under-developed oil-producer won its independence in a January referendum -- the climax of a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of fighting with the north.

Security forces at first tried to control the streets in the south's dusty capital Juba, but retreated as jubilant crowds moved in overnight and through the day, waving flags, dancing and chanting "South Sudan o-yei, freedom o-yei."

Some revelers fainted in the blistering heat as South Sudan's parliamentary speaker James Wani Igga read out the formal declaration of independence.

"We, the democratically elected representatives of the people ... hereby declare Southern Sudan to be an independent and sovereign state," said Igga before Sudan's flag was lowered, the South Sudan flag was raised and the new anthem sung. Salva Kiir took the oath of office.

People threw their hands in the air, embraced and wept. "We got it. We got it," one man said as he hugged a woman.

The presence of Bashir, who campaigned to keep Africa's largest nation united, was an important signal of the north's goodwill.

It will also be an embarrassment to some Western diplomats. The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Bashir, on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

Dignitaries including U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the leaders of about 30 African nations attended.

In a possible sign of the South's new allegiances, the crowd included about 200 supporters of Darfur rebel leader Abdel Wahed al-Nur, whose forces are fighting Khartoum in an eight-year insurgency just over South Sudan's border in the north.

Earlier, the supporters of Nur's rebel Sudan Liberation Army faction stood in a line chanting "Welcome, welcome new state," wearing T-shirts bearing their leader's image. One carried a banner reading "El Bashir is wanted dead or alive."

Traditional dance groups drummed and waved shields and staffs in a carnival atmosphere.

"I am very pleased," said Joma Cirilow, 47, his hand on his son's shoulder. "Do you want to be a second class citizen? No, I want to be a first class citizen in my own country."

The crowd cheered as Kiir unveiled a giant statue of civil war hero John Garang, the man who signed the peace deal with the north.

"Today we raise the flag of South Sudan to join the nations of the world. A day of victory and celebration," Pagan Amum, the secretary general of the South's ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) told Reuters.

"Free at last," said Simon Agany, 34, as he walked around shaking hands after midnight -- the time when officials said the South actually became the world's newest nation. "Coming away from the north is total freedom."

TENSION

North Sudan's Khartoum government was the first to recognize the new state on Friday, hours before the split took place, a move that smoothed the way to the division.

The recognition did not dispel fears of future tensions.

Northern and southern leaders have still not agreed on a list of issues, most importantly the line of the border, the ownership of the disputed Abyei region and how they will handle oil revenues, the lifeblood of both economies.

At the stroke of midnight the Republic of Sudan lost almost a third of its territory and about three quarters of its oil reserves, which are sited in the south. It faced the future with insurgencies in its Darfur and Southern Kordofan regions.

In Khartoum on Saturday, one sign of the new national order was the disappearance of some English-language and SPLM-linked newspapers. The north said it suspended them on Friday as they were published or owned by southerners -- an ominous signal for more than 1 million southerners left in the north.

A column in the northern state-linked Sudan Vision newspaper called the loss of the south a "blessing in disguise," saying it would end civil war and likening it to the amputation of an unhealthy limb. Many northerners see the separation as a major loss of face.

Analysts have long feared a return to war if north/south disputes are not resolved.

The U.N.'s Ban told reporters in Juba on Friday South Sudan would soon join the global body.

The United Nations Security Council voted on Friday to establish a force of up to 7,000 peacekeepers for South Sudan.

Mostly Muslim Sudan and South Sudan, where most follow Christianity and traditional beliefs, fought each other for all but a few years since the 1950s in civil wars fueled by ethnicity, religion, oil and ideology.

(Additional reporting by Ulf Laessing, Andrew Heavens and Khaled Abdelaziz in Khartoum and Megan Davies at the United Nations; Writing by Andrew Heavens; Editing by Jon Hemming)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110709/wl_nm/us_sudan

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