South Sudan to be new nation’s name

• The decision must still be voted on by the parliament but SPLM has majority

JUBA, Tuesday

South Sudan will be the name of the world’s newest nation when it achieves international recognition in July, a top official of its ruling party said today.

“We as SPLM leadership have taken a position that the new state... shall be called south Sudan,” said Pagan Amum, secretary general of the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement.

“This is because the people who have exercised their right of self-determination were the people of south Sudan,” Mr Amum told reporters in the southern capital, speaking during a break in talks between the party’s top leaders, where the choice was made.

The decision must still be voted on by the southern parliament, but with the SPLM holding the vast majority of seats it seems likely the choice of name will stick.

“We will be asking the government of south Sudan, and the parliament, and our caucus of SPLM, to vote for the name of a country that will be called south Sudan,” Mr Amum said.

In a landmark independence vote last month, almost 99 per cent of southerners voted to secede and split Africa’s largest country in two.

Others suggestions for the country’s name had ranged from Nile Republic to Cush, a Biblical reference, but south Sudan always appeared the popular choice.

Amum said the south faced many challenges and he voiced “deep pain and sorrow” that clashes last week between rebels and the southern army had killed 197. Another southern official later said the number