I want to thank you for the briefing, especially looking at the long-term, post referendum. I think that's really helpful to us.
I do have two quick questions. I spent a fair bit of time on the phone this weekend with people from Washington, people who have just returned as part of a Congressional delegation from that region. They had some interesting views. They believe that the referendum will go ahead and that the north will not cause great obstacles to that. There will be other issues around Abyei and other things, but around that, that's what they believe.
They seemed to have great concern that so much emphasis has gone into Juba and not into the regional areas. They say themselves that they have failed on that and that they need to get going with that. The Obama administration is now seized with this issue, and is seeking to move out more to the border areas as well.
Their concern is migration: what happens when a referendum is signed and people come out of Darfur, as well as other areas--the people who are trapped in the north as well.
They were wondering...because CIDA had involved itself a little bit with the Darfur exit coming out into south Sudan a couple of years ago, does Canada have a strategy as to how it might help the IOM with all of the people who are coming back? They fear there might, in the end, be two million, and it will overrun the services.
I would like to link that to a number of months ago when the International Crisis Group was here. They said their major concern was not north-south, it was south-south. Their concern was also with all the exiles and others coming back, that it would overrun these services and therefore exacerbate an already difficult situation.
I wonder if you have any views on what you've discussed there and if you have any plans, as the Americans had hoped, maybe, around the exiles and those who are returning.