A whopping 99% of the ballots cast by Southern Sudanese were in favor of secession from Sudan and forming the world’s newest country. "This is what we voted for, so that people can be free in their own country…. I say congratulations a million times," South Sudan President Salva Kiir told the crowd. The referendum, which took place over the course of a week in early January, had been peaceful and signaled a positive end to two decades of bloody civil war. Of the 3.7 million votes cast in South Sudan, only 16,000 chose to remain part of Sudan, according to the referendum’s commission. South Sudan is now expected to declare independence on July 9 after border demarcations and oil rights have been negotiated.
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