Farewell tour

Sudan | South Sudan president says goodbye to one administration with anxiety about what kind of friend the next will be | Mindy Belz

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

BOONE, N.C.—Most heads of state held off on winter trips to the White House until after President-elect Barack Obama could take office Jan. 20. South Sudan's president Salva Kiir traveled to Washington earlier in the month to meet with the outgoing president. "I wanted to come and bid farewell to President Bush because he is leaving office and he has stood behind the people of Southern Sudan," Kiir told reporters Jan. 7. "We came to tell him thank you and that we will remember him and let him know that he must keep the people of South Sudan close to his heart."

Kiir, 57, holds dual positions in a unity government that took office in 2005 after the parties to Sudan's two-decade civil war signed a Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) brokered in part by the Bush administration. He is first vice president of Sudan, the government based in Khartoum, and president of South Sudan, a semi-autonomous government which under the CPA's terms could split off from Sudan following a referendum set for 2011.