Maduro wins second term

Venezuela was facing the threat of fresh international sanctions and intensified domestic unrest yesterday following President Nicolas Maduro's re-election in a vote rejected by the opposition as a farce.

Election officials said Maduro won 68 percent of the votes cast in Sunday's presidential poll, far ahead of the 21 percent won by his nearest rival, ex-army officer Henri Falcon.

In an address to cheering supporters outside Miraflores Palace in Caracas, Maduro hailed his victory for another six-year term as a "historic record".

"We won again! We triumphed again! We are the force of history turned into a permanent popular victory!" Maduro told those gathered to celebrate his "knockout" victory.

But the vote was marred by a 52 percent abstention rate -- a historic high -- following a boycott called by the Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD) opposition coalition, which slammed the ballot as a "farce."

And even before it took place, the United States, Canada, the European Union and a dozen Latin American countries said they would not recognise the results.

Falcon, a loyalist of the late leftist firebrand Hugo Chavez who was neck-and-neck with Maduro in pre-election surveys, said the vote lacked "legitimacy" and accused the government of vote buying.

"For us, there were no elections," he told reporters. "We have to have new elections in Venezuela."

And third-placed Javier Bertucci, an evangelist preacher who polled around 11 percent, also joined the call for new elections.

Maduro may have won, but the near future appears bleak. Venezuela is isolated and deep in the worst economic crisis of its history, with its people enduring food and medicine shortages.

"The upcoming scenario is clear: political tension and radicalization, repression, massive international rejection, a sharpening of sanctions, and a climax to the economic crisis," said analyst Luis Vicente Leon.