Rarely has the power of a celebrity to draw attention to an issue exerted such a pull as on Tuesday, when White House reporters called an end to the daily briefing by press secretary Robert Gibbs to catch the actor George Clooney as he left a meeting with President Obama about the crisis in Sudan.

Upstream countries, looking to right what they say are historic wrongs, have joined in an attempt to break Egypt and Sudan’s near-monopoly on the water, threatening a crisis that Egyptian experts said could, at its most extreme, lead to war.

Alec Ross, Secretary Clinton's Senior Advisor for Innovation, said the new policy is designed to promote access to global education and culture by permitting certain telecommunications equipment and services to flow to those countries. Export of those equipment and services had previously been blocked by U.S. sanctions.

WASHINGTON -- A recent “pivot” of U.S. sanctions policy toward Iran, Sudan and Cuba was discussed in detail this morning by a senior State Department official.

Alec Ross, Secretary Clinton's Senior Advisor for Innovation, said the new policy is designed to promote access to global education and culture by permitting certain telecommunications equipment and services to flow to those countries. Export of those equipment and services had previously been blocked by U.S. sanctions.

But the countries that share the Nile River basin – Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo – are tired of Egypt, and to a lesser extent Sudan, dictating the terms of the river water’s usage.

Having put behind an election described by international observers as successful "given the prevailing circumstances", the Sudanese Government is looking to go one more better by waging an aggressive campaign to rid itself of the ‘rogue’ nation tag ascribed by former US President George W Bush.

The Voice of America ( VOA ) has launched special broadcasts to Sudan and created a content-rich website on elections more than a month before Sudanese are to vote in the country’s first free presidential contest since 1986.