Sudan's president Tuesday said he would support the country's oil-producing south if it chose independence in a looming referendum, in his closest acknowledgement of the possibility of separation. The unusually conciliatory speech from President Omar Hassan Al-Bashir came as Sudan marked the fifth anniversary of a 2005 peace deal that ended more than two decades of north-south civil war and promised the referendum. Southerners are widely expected to choose independence in the ballot, set for January 2011, although analysts have up to now warned Bashir's northern supporters would resist any loss of control over southern oil fields. Bashir told dignitaries gathered in the remote southern town of Yambio that his northern National Congress Party (NCP) still wanted to keep Sudan unified. “But if the result of the referendum is separation ... the Khartoum government will be the first to recognize this decision.”
