Sudan concludes Darfur referendum, vote counting begins

Vote counting got underway in Darfur on Wednesday after three days of referendum voting on administrative status of the region.

Calm was observed in various polling stations of the West Sudanese region.

Nearly 3.5 million Darfuris had registered to participate in the exercise seeking to unify Darfur’s five states into a single administrative unit.

The vote counting is however expected to experience some difficulties, owing to communication hitches and inaccessibility of some areas.

This vote has been criticized by Paris and Washington who believe that current conditions do not favour credible result.

Darfur has been rocked by chaos and violence between government forces and non-Arab insurgents who feel ethnically marginalized by the regime dominated by Arabs .

The conflict has left at least 300,000 dead and some 2.5 million displaced, according to UN.