BBC News with Jonathan Izard

President Barack Obama has welcomed the successful completion of voting on the first day of southern Sudan's referendum on independence. He said it was a historic step toward implementing the comprehensive peace deal that ended the war between north and south in 2005, and the United States was fully committed to helping the new African state expected to be approved by the vote. A big turnout was reported at polling stations across southern Sudan. Southerners in the north also voted, but the mood there was more subdued. A senior official from President Omar al-Bashir's National Congress Party, Ibrahim Ghandour, says separation is an inevitable consequence of the peace deal known as the CPA.