Mali leader: Presidential election set for July 28

BAMAKO, Mali (AP) — Mali's interim leader says the country's presidential vote will take place on July 28 after months of speculation about the date.

On a visit to Belgium ahead of a donors' conference for Mali, President Dioncounda Traore also said Tuesday that neither he nor any member of the transitional government would run for office.

A field of about a dozen candidates is expected to take part in the election, which faces significant logistical and security challenges.

Some critics have questioned how the vote can go forward when hundreds of thousands of Malians remain displaced.

Radical jihadists have launched a series of suicide bombings across the north, raising fears for the safety of the vote, which comes more than a year after a coup toppled the previous government.

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Australia delays promised budget surplus as election looms

By James Grubel

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Australia's struggling Labor government on Tuesday used the last budget before national elections to delay a long-promised return to surplus, blaming a stubbornly high Australian dollar and lower commodity prices for a dramatic fall in revenues.

With polls pointing to a solid defeat for Prime Minister Julia Gillard at elections set for September 14, Treasurer Wayne Swan locked in 10 years of funding for landmark disability and school education policies aimed at reversing its downward trajectory, and committed more money to roads and suburban rail projects.

But the budget, with little room for traditional pre-election give-aways and with voters traditionally wary of government borrowing, was unlikely to do much to help revive support.

Instead, Swan has cut a range of benefits to middle-income families, putting off planned tax cuts, increasing a health levy on income, and scrapping a A$5,000 ($5,000) baby bonus popular with voters and which had helped address an aging population.

Swan defended the cuts as measured and balanced, and said the decision to abandon the surplus was right for the economic circumstances.

"To those who would take us down the European road of savage austerity, I say the social destruction that comes from cutting too much, too hard, too fast is not the Australian way," Swan said.

The Australian Greens, whose support is crucial for the government to pass its legislation, said they would not block the main budget measures, but could oppose specific cuts, including plans to cut funding to universities.

"In terms of blocking supply, no the Greens won't be blocking supply," Greens leader Christine Milne told reporters. "But we will certainly be looking at all the legislation that is coming through and we certainly won't be supporting university cuts."

Swan defended the tough measures by pointing to a A$17 billion drop in expected revenue since his previous budget, with a total write down of A$60 billion over the next four years, and said the measures were needed to support growth and jobs in the face of a flagging global economy.

Market reaction to the budget was muted, but the Australian dollar fell to an 11-month low to $0.9908, breaking below reported bids around $0.9920 to mark its lowest since mid-June 2012. So far this year, the Aussie has fallen 4.7 percent.

Australia, a major supplier of coal and iron ore, has enjoyed 21 years of uninterrupted economic growth, surviving the 2008 global financial crisis without dipping into recession, thanks to a mining boom fuelled by strong demand from resource hungry China, its biggest trade partner.

But the fall in global commodity prices, coupled with an Australian dollar which has traded above parity with the US dollar for most of the past two years, has hammered company profits and tax revenues.

The 2013/14 deficit was forecast at A$18 billion or 1.1 percent of GDP, down from a A$2.2 billion surplus forecast in October, but in line with economist expectations.

Swan outlined A$43 billion of savings over four years as part of a plan to return a balanced budget by the year to June 30, 2016.

AAA RATINGS NOT AFFECTED

Ratings agencies Standard & Poors and Moody's Investors Service said the budget had no impact on Australia's AAA credit ratings.

"The outlook on the Australian government's Aaa bond rating remains stable despite the move into a period of budget deficits beyond that originally forecasted," said Moody's senior vice president Steven Hess.

Swan said the Australian dollar had remained stubbornly high despite a steep fall in Australia's terms of trade over the past year.

At the same time, Swan dramatically downgraded the revenue from Australia's controversial 30 percent profits tax on coal and iron ore mines, which began on July 1, 2012.

The budget forecasts the tax, originally expected to raise A$13.4 billion over its first four years, will now raise only A$3.3 billion in that time.

The government has also slashed expected revenue from its price on carbon after revising down the expected carbon price from June 2015, when Australia links its trading scheme to the European carbon scheme.

The government now predicts a carbon price of A$12.10 a metric ton from June 2015, compared to its previous forecast of A$29 a metric ton. The price of EU carbon permits hit a six-day low of around A$4.20 late on Monday.

To help make up for falling revenues, Swan said the government would use its leadership of the Group of 20 wealthy nations next year to drive a crackdown on tax loopholes and evasion by multinational companies, helping recoup as much as A$4.2 billion.

Facing a shaky world economy and sovereign debt woes ailing Europe, Australia's economic outlook remained positive, with growth forecast to slow to 2.75 percent in 2013-14 from 3.0 percent this year, before climbing back to 3.0 percent for the following three years.

That compares to forecast growth in 2013 of 1.25 percent in Japan, 2.0 percent in the United States and -0.5 percent in the euro area.

In a nation wary of government debt, Swan has long promised to deliver surplus budgets. But he has delivered six straight deficits, in part due to hefty stimulus spending in 2008 and 2009 to help buffer the country from the global slowdown.

He forecast a deficit of A$19.4 billion in 2012/13, or about 1.3 percent of GDP.

Net debt is expected to peak at A$191.6 billion, or 11.4 percent of GDP, in 2014-15 - still less than one eighth of the debt levels of major advanced economies.

(Editing by Eric Meijer)

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Resounding election victory for Pakistan's Sharif

LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — Former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif looked poised Sunday to return to office with a resounding election victory — a mandate that could make it easier to tackle the country's daunting problems, including growing power outages, weak economic growth and shaky government finances.

Questions remain, however, about Sharif's stance on another key issue: violent Islamic extremism. Critics have accused his party of being soft on radicals because it hasn't cracked down on militant groups in its stronghold of Punjab province.

That could be a concern for the United States, which has pushed Pakistan for years to take stronger action against a variety of Islamic militant groups, especially fighters staging cross-border attacks against American troops in Afghanistan.

As unofficial returns rolled in Sunday, a day after the election, state TV estimates put Sharif close to the majority in the national assembly needed to govern outright for the next five years. Even if he falls short of that threshold, independent candidates almost certain to swing in Sharif's favor would give his Pakistan Muslim League-N party a ruling majority.

That would put the 63-year-old Sharif in a much stronger position than the outgoing Pakistan People's Party, which ruled for five years with a weak coalition that was often on the verge of collapse.

Pakistan suffers from a growing energy crisis, with some areas experiencing power outages for up to 18 hours a day. That has seriously hurt the economy, pushing growth below 4 percent a year. The country needs a growth rate of twice that to provide jobs for its expanding population of 180 million.

Ballooning energy subsidies and payments to keep failing public enterprises afloat have steadily eaten away at the government's finances, forcing the country to seek another unpopular bailout from the International Monetary Fund. Pakistan also has an ineffective tax system, depriving the government of funds.

Sharif, the son of a wealthy industrialist, is seen by many as more likely to tackle the country's economic problems effectively because much of his party's support comes from businessmen. He is also expected to push for better relations with Pakistan's archenemy and neighbor India, which could help the economy.

The Pakistan People's Party was widely perceived to have done little on the economic front.

"Anything better than zero and you have already improved on the PPP's performance in terms of managing the economy," said Cyril Almeida, a columnist for Pakistan's Dawn newspaper.

The former ruling party was soundly beaten in Saturday's election. Sharif's party was leading in contests for 127 seats, just short of the 137 directly elected seats needed to form a majority, state TV said.

The PPP was ahead in contests for 32 national assembly seats, based on partial vote counts. That is a significant drop from the 91 seats the party won in the 2008 election.

Independent candidates were leading in more than 20 contests, and they historically join the party that forms the government, which would leave the Pakistan Muslim League-N with a majority.

"I'm sure business and the economy will be far better in a couple of years," said Amir Nayaz, one of hundreds of Sharif supporters who gathered outside his home in Punjab's capital, Lahore, beating on drums, dancing and chanting slogans.

It was a remarkable comeback for the two-time prime minister, who was toppled in a 1999 coup by then-army chief Gen. Pervez Musharraf and was sent into exile in Saudi Arabia for years. He returned in 2007, and his party came in second in elections the following year.

Over the last five years, Sharif put steady pressure on the PPP-led government. But because he was wary of army interference, he never applied enough pressure to threaten the government's hold on power. That attitude helped enable parliament to complete its term and transfer power in democratic elections for the first time since the country was founded in 1947.

President Barack Obama praised "the historic peaceful and transparent transfer of civilian power."

In an ironic twist, the man who toppled Sharif in a military coup, Musharraf, is currently under house arrest in the country after returning from self-imposed exile. It will be up to Sharif's government to decide whether to bring treason charges against Musharraf in the Supreme Court.

Sharif's party managed to weather a serious challenge from former cricket star Imran Khan, whose criticism of the country's traditional politicians energized the youth. Even though Khan failed to deliver his promised "political tsunami," his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party did much better than it had historically.

It was leading in contests for 31 national assembly seats, state TV said, and appeared to be in position to possibly form the government in northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The party boycotted elections in 2008 and only won one national assembly seat in 2002.

The Pakistani Taliban, which has been waging a bloody insurgency against the government, tried to derail the election with attacks. More than 150 people were killed with guns and bombs in the run-up to the election, including 29 on election day.

The deadly campaign failed to keep people away from the polls. Turnout was nearly 60 percent, the highest in more than 40 years, the election commission said. But the violence, which mainly targeted secular parties, may have helped candidates seen as taking a softer line toward the militants, like Sharif and Khan, because they were able to campaign more freely.

Sharif has called for negotiations with the Pakistani Taliban but hasn't said clearly whether he thinks army operations against the militants should continue until peace is achieved. His party, which has ruled Punjab for the past five years, has not taken any clear action against the powerful Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group based in that province. Those militants are blamed for the 2008 attack on the Indian city of Mumbai that killed 166 people.

"I don't think that these guys have enough understanding of the risk," said Imtiaz Gul, director of the Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies, referring to Sharif's party members. "They think they cannot afford to stoke unnecessary trouble for them by cracking down on people or groups who are extremists or terrorists."

It's also unclear what Sharif's policy will be toward neighboring Afghanistan, where the U.S. plans to withdraw most of its combat troops by 2014 and is seeking help from Pakistan to negotiate peace with the Afghan Taliban. Pakistan and Afghanistan have long had tense relations.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai promised "full cooperation" with Pakistan's new government Sunday, but alluded to the often-hostile relationship between the two countries and suspicions that Islamabad has aided insurgents and contributed to Afghanistan's instability.

"We hope that the new elected government provides the ground for peace and brotherhood with Afghanistan" and cooperates "in rooting out terrorist sanctuaries," he said.

The U.S. and Pakistan have also had a troubled relationship, especially after the 2011 American raid that killed Osama bin Laden in a Pakistani army town.

Sharif is expected to be somewhat more nationalistic and protective of state sovereignty when it comes to relations with the U.S. than the outgoing government. He defied U.S. opposition to Pakistan's nuclear test in 1998 and has criticized unpopular American drone attacks targeting militants in the country. But that doesn't mean the relationship will radically change, especially since the army often plays a dominant role in foreign policy issues.

"At the end of the day, Sharif is a businessman, and he looks at these things through a kind of pragmatic analysis," Almedia said. "I don't see any reason for him to want ties with U.S. to be poor, tense or troublesome."

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Associated Press writers Rebecca Santana, Munir Ahmed and Zarar Khan in Islamabad and Kathy Gannon in Kabul, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.

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Abbot reported from Islamabad.

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Abduction, attacks mar run-up to Pakistan election

ISLAMABAD (AP) — An especially violent spate of killings, kidnappings and bombings marred the run-up to Pakistan's nationwide election, capped Thursday by the abduction of the son of a former prime minister as he was rallying supporters on the last day of campaigning before the historic vote.

Saturday's election marks the first time in Pakistan's military coup-riddled history that a civilian government has finished its term and will hand over power to another. But the significance of the occasion has been overshadowed by the relentless violence targeting mostly liberal, secular parties.

More than 125 people have been killed by a series of bombings and shootings that can mostly be traced to Taliban militants who have vowed to disrupt a democratic process they view as un-Islamic. Separatists in the southwestern province of Baluchistan have also attacked candidates and their supporters across the political spectrum.

There was no claim of responsibility for the abduction of 25-year-old Ali Haider Gilani, but suspicion immediately fell on the Taliban. Gilani is running for a provincial assembly seat under the banner of the Pakistan People's Party, one of three parties the Taliban has singled out for retribution because they supported military operations against Taliban insurgents in northwestern Pakistan.

His father, Yousuf Raza Gilani, is a longtime member of the PPP who served as prime minister while many of those military operations were carried out.

The younger Gilani was leaving an election event in the city of Multan in southern Punjab province when attackers pulled up in a car and motorcycle, sprayed the area with bullets, threw him into one of the vehicles and drove off, officials and witnesses said.

"One of the gunmen grabbed Haider, who had blood splashed on his trousers," said rally participant Shehryar Ali in comments aired by Pakistani television broadcaster Geo News.

The former prime minister has been campaigning heavily in Multan to help his three sons, who are all running for elected office in the district, but he was not at the rally when his son was taken.

Appearing shaken, the elder Gilani said in televised comments that two bodyguards were killed in the attack, but he did not know whether his son was wounded.

"His two guards were shielding him, and they died," the former premier said. "I urge all of my party supporters to remain peaceful and participate in the vote."

Gilani was forced out of office last summer by the Supreme Court after refusing to pursue a corruption case against President Asif Ali Zardari.

Although his ouster from office meant he could not run in this election, the Gilani family is still heavily represented in the Multan district races. In addition to the son who was abducted, the former prime minister has two sons running for national assembly seats.

The Pakistan People's Party, along with the Karachi-based Muttahida Quami Movement and the Awami National Party, have been singled out for attack by the Taliban. All were part of the outgoing government during a time when there were repeated military offensives against Taliban militants in the tribal areas.

The threat has forced all three to severely curtail their election events. Instead of the large, outdoor rallies the PPP used in 2008 to whip up support among thousands of voters, the party has relied on television and newspaper ads and smaller indoor gatherings where security is more manageable. In northwest Pakistan, candidates from the Awami National Party held election events inside private homes under heavy security or reached out to voters via social media and by telephone.

Officials with the PPP lashed out Thursday after Gilani's abduction, saying the security forces have done little to protect them.

"We were screaming that we need security for our candidates. We were saying that we have received threats, but no one heard our pleas, and we did not get security," said a party spokeswoman, Sharmila Farouqi. "Now see what has happened. The son of a former prime minister has been kidnapped."

There is also concern that the inability of the three parties to properly campaign will unfairly tilt the race in the favor of parties who have a more favorable view toward the Taliban and oppose military operations in the tribal areas.

The Pakistani Taliban has been waging a bloody insurgency in Pakistan for years to enforce Islamic law in the country and break the government's alliance with the United States in fighting militants. They have killed thousands of civilians and security personnel in scores of gun and bomb attacks.

But in recent weeks even those parties favoring negotiations have not been immune.

On Thursday, a bomb targeting an election office of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam in the North Waziristan tribal area near Afghanistan killed one person, according to two Pakistani intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam is considered more favorable to the Pakistani Taliban and has supported negotiations with the militants over military operations.

It was the third attack on the party this week. On Monday, 25 people died when a bomb exploded at an election rally, and 13 people died Tuesday in two separate attacks targeting party representatives.

Regardless of the security threats, the PPP is expected to fare poorly in the vote after presiding over a five-year term that saw inflation skyrocket and widespread electricity blackouts become the norm across the country.

The Pakistan Muslim League-N, headed by two-time former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, is seen as the front-runner, while the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, headed by former cricket star Imran Khan, is considered a wild card who could gain significant seats.

Khan may also benefit from widespread sympathy following a fall Tuesday during an election rally in the eastern city of Lahore while he was being raised by a forklift to a stage to address his followers. The 60-year-old Khan fractured a vertebra in his neck and two in his back, cracked a rib and cut his head in the accident, which kept him from participating in the last days of the campaign.

On Thursday, Khan addressed a rally of at least 25,000 flag-waving supporters in Islamabad via video link from his hospital bed, asking them to make sure to vote for his party on election day.

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Associated Press writers Asif Shahzad in Islamabad, Zaheer Babar in Lahore and Rasool Dawar in Peshawar contributed to this report.

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Pakistan's ruling party struggles in election

ISLAMABAD (AP) — The campaign posters for the Pakistan People's Party show both why it has been so popular for so long and why it's in trouble ahead of this Saturday's national election: two of the party icons on the posters are dead and a third is not old enough to be a candidate.

As the historic vote approaches, one of South Asia's most venerable parties has problems.

The party rode to power in 2008 on a wave of sympathy following the assassination of longtime party leader Benazir Bhutto but now it is struggling after five unpopular years in office. Their campaign was made even more difficult after Taliban threats made it dangerous to hold public political functions, so the party's leader and current star, Bhutto's son, hasn't done rallies to fire up the faithful.

The result has been a subdued campaign for the incumbent party.

"It is very quiet," said Asad Sayeed, from the Karachi-based Collective for Social Science Research.

The PPP has taken out extensive ads in newspapers and on Pakistan television touting their accomplishments and more importantly reminding voters of the Bhutto family's extensive sacrifices in politics. Party founder Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was executed in 1979 after a military coup, and his daughter Benazir died in 2007 from a gun and bomb attack widely blamed on the Taliban.

One television ad starts with a sound bite from the founder of the PPP, then goes to a clip of Benazir Bhutto's last speech before her death and ends with a clip of her son, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, shouting energetically to an unseen crowd about the sacrifices he's ready to make for his followers. At 24, he can't run for parliament but he's the most famous living Bhutto in a party that's synonymous with the name.

But ads only go so far for the PPP as much of their traditional vote bank is from the rural poor, who don't own a television and can't read even if they could buy a newspaper. That's why analysts say the rallies have always been particularly important to the party's get-out-the-vote drive.

"In the past it's always been a charismatic leader who has been leading those rallies. And that's not there," said Sayeed.

Even with their diminished popularity, many analysts still expect the Pakistan People's Party to at least come in second during Saturday's vote. The Pakistan Muslim League-N, lead by former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, is expected to win. Under the Pakistani system, a strong second-place showing could mean they'd be an active opposition or get a chance to form the coalition if others fail.

The party has had some successes during its time in office. President Asif Ali Zardari, Benazir Bhutto's widower, managed to hold together an unwieldy, fractured coalition government for a full five-year term — making it the first elected civilian government in Pakistan's history to finish its term and hand power to another elected civilian government.

The PPP government also pushed through legislation devolving power to the provinces and restricting the power of the presidency.

But in a country reeling from power cuts that last more than half the day, rising inflation and deteriorating security, those political victories don't put food on people's plates or money in their wallets. The party has to defend a record that many have pilloried, and it's running as an incumbent — not as the underdog it likes to portray itself as.

"I think it's going to be very difficult for them to play this (victim) card this time around," said Moeed Yusuf, South Asia adviser at the United States Institute of Peace.

And having Bilawal Bhutto largely sidelined is a blow.

Bilawal — known generally by his first name — was only 19 when his mother died. His father was named by his deceased wife in her will as the leader of the PPP, but the elder Zardari immediately handed that post to his son.

Bilawal was away at college in Britain so in practice his father ran the party for the next five years, but on December 27, the younger Zardari was formally launched into Pakistani politics at a ceremony on the anniversary of his mother's death. The party said he would be taking part in the campaign through rallies or other events such as small gatherings.

But a decision by Bilawal to fly to Dubai in March just as the race was heating up raised eyebrows. The official version of events was that threats to his life forced him to leave the country. That's been a definite possibility. The Taliban is believed responsible for near-daily attacks against political candidates.

But rumors also circulated of a spat with his father. Whatever the reason, Bilawal eventually returned to Pakistan but has played little public role in the campaign.

A PPP candidate in the southern port city of Karachi, Rashid Rabbani, said Bilawal's television advertisements have helped but personal appearances would have been better.

"It would have been a lot better if the party's young chairman ... could have come in the field and addressed election rallies," he said.

Other key party figures such as former prime ministers Raja Pervaiz Ashraf and Yousuf Raza Gilani have not stepped up to lead the party at a national level. Ashraf has focused on the tough race he is running for reelection outside of Islamabad and Gilani has focused on helping his sons' election run.

President Zardari is restricted by his office from actively campaigning in the election. But even if he were able to campaign, Zardari is deeply unpopular in Pakistan, where many voters view him as corrupt.

Party supporters recognize the challenges.

A PPP member of the outgoing parliament, Shahnaz Wazir Ali, said it will take time for Bilawal to gain the experience to match his mother as a politician. The party also does not want to risk losing him in a terror attack like the one that took his mother. As a result, Ali said, they are going into the crucial election without a central figure to rally around.

Ali also recognized that after five difficult years in office, the party will have to run with the weight of incumbency at a time when many Pakistanis simply want something different.

"Most people that I talk to in Pakistan want change, especially the younger generation," she said.

The party, which draws its strength from the poor, rural areas of southern Sindh province, also failed to recognize the shift from the countryside to the cities that has been taking place in Pakistan, or to capitalize on the huge number of young voters expected to go to the polls, she said.

Still, the party maintains a strong reserve of dependable voters in Sindh, where the Bhutto family's ancestral home is located and where both Benazir and her father are buried.

Many people in rural Sindh are worried that a national government dominated by their more populous northern neighbor, Punjab province, would ignore their needs. The popularity of the government's Benazir Income Support Program, which gives cash to poor people, might also draw voters.

There is also a deep emotional tie between some Pakistanis and a party whose leaders have sacrificed their very lives for their followers.

"People's party has retained its standing among a section of the population which comes from lower classes, and some families no matter what their social status, they are emotionally committed to the Bhuttos," said Rasul Bakhsh Rais, professor of political science at Lahore University of Management Sciences.

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Associated Press writer Zarar Khan in Islamabad contributed to this report.

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Obama: US not interfering in Venezuelan election

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) — President Barack Obama says the idea that an American filmmaker detained by Venezuela's government is a spy is, in his words, "ridiculous."

Thirty-five-year-old Timothy Tracy, of West Hollywood, California, was formally charged last week with crimes including conspiracy, association for criminal purposes and use of a false document.

Obama says Tracy's case will be handled like every other in which a U.S. citizen gets into a "legal tangle" while abroad.

The president also said the U.S. hasn't tried "in any way" to interfere with Venezuela's recent election of Nicolas Maduro as president. Maduro is the hand-picked successor to the late Hugo Chavez. Opposition leader Henrique Capriles narrowly lost to Maduro and claims the election was stolen.

Obama commented in an interview with Spanish-language network Telemundo that's set to air Sunday.

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Big election lead for Malaysia ruling coalition

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia's long-governing coalition commanded a formidable lead in national elections Sunday after a record number of voters cast ballots, capturing 80 of the 112 seats it needs to extend its 56-year rule.

Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's three-party alliance seized 37 of the 222 parliamentary seats in results released so far by Malaysia's Election Commission.

The alliance is the most unified challenge yet to Prime Minister Najib Razak's National Front coalition, which has triumphed in 12 consecutive general elections since independence from Britain in 1957.

The opposition hoped to capitalize on widespread allegations of arrogance, abuse of public funds and racial discrimination against the ruling coalition.

Many of the seats won so far were in the National Front's traditional rural strongholds, especially in Borneo, where Anwar's alliance had been hoping to make major inroads to bolster its chances of victory.

More than 10 million Malaysians cast ballots for a record turnout of 80 percent of about 13 million registered voters, the Election Commission said in preliminary estimates. They were also voting to fill vacancies in 12 of Malaysia's 13 state legislatures.

Even if it retains power, the National Front showed clear signs of vulnerability compared to its peak in 2004, when it won 90 percent of Parliament's seats.

The opposition stayed in control of northern Penang state, one of Malaysia's wealthiest territories, and remained strong in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's biggest city, where middle-class voters have clamored for national change.

Three well-known Cabinet ministers and at least one state chief minister were likely to lose their seats. The Malaysian Chinese Association, the second-biggest party in the ruling coalition, saw many of its candidates defeated as Malaysia's ethnic Chinese minority community continued to abandon the National Front.

Some people lined up for more than an hour at schools and other voting centers, showing off fingers marked with ink to prevent multiple voting after they had finished.

The National Front held 135 seats in Parliament before this month. It is anxious to secure a stronger five-year mandate and regain the two-thirds legislative majority that it held for years but lost in 2008.

"The government has made some mistakes but the prime minister has made changes and I believe they (the National Front) will do their best to take care of the people's welfare," said Mohamed Rafiq Idris, a car business owner who waited in a long line at a central Selangor state voting center with his wife and son.

Andrew Charles, a Malaysian businessman working in Australia, flew home to vote for the opposition because he believes it can end corruption and mistrust between the Malay Muslim majority and ethnic Chinese, Indian and smaller minorities.

"I am really fed up. There are more abuses in the system and there is no equality among the races. After 56 years, it is time to give others a chance to change this country," he said after voting in a suburb outside Kuala Lumpur.

Najib says only the National Front can maintain stability in Malaysia, which has long been among Southeast Asia's most peaceful countries.

"Your support is paramount if we are to keep to our path of development, if we are to continue our journey toward complete transformation," Najib said in a statement to voters. "This election is about fulfilling promises, bringing hope and upholding trustworthiness."

An opposition win would mark a remarkable comeback for Anwar, a former deputy prime minister who was fired in 1998 and subsequently jailed on corruption and sodomy charges that he says were fabricated by his political enemies. He was released from jail in 2004.

Anwar and other opposition leaders voiced deep fears Sunday about electoral fraud. Claims of bogus ballots and an apparent ease in which some voters cleaned the ink stains off their fingers dominated social media.

Opposition leaders said the National Front was using foreign migrants from Bangladesh, the Philippines and Indonesia to vote unlawfully. Government and electoral authorities deny the allegations.

"We have in fact jointly condemned this, which is not only fraudulent but virtually attempting to steal the elections, which is unconstitutional, disregard for the law," Anwar told reporters.

The National Front's aura of invincibility has been under threat since three of Malaysia's main opposition parties combined forces five years ago. In recent years the National Front has been increasingly accused of complacency and heavy-handed rule.

Najib, who took office in 2009, embarked on a major campaign to restore his coalition's luster. In recent months, authorities have provided cash handouts to low-income families and used government-linked newspapers and TV stations to criticize the opposition's ability to rule.

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Venezuela lawmakers brawl amid election tensions

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan lawmakers punched, kicked and shoved one another as a postelection conflict between President Hugo Chavez's heirs and rivals blew up into a brawl on the floor of congress.

Tuesday night's clash erupted when members of the opposition coalition unfurled a banner in the National Assembly denouncing a ruling that strips them of most legislative powers unless they recognize the April 14 election victory of President Nicolas Maduro.

Assembly member Julio Borges appeared on an independent television station soon after Tuesday night's brawl with blood running down one side of his swollen face. The opposition said at least 17 of its allies and five pro-government deputies were injured.

Opposition lawmaker Ismael Garcia said government loyalists threw the first punches. Pro-government legislators appeared on state TV accusing opposition members of attacking them. Video showed groups of legislators shoving and pushing each other on the floor.

The opposition has refused to accept Maduro's narrow victory, saying the government's 1.49 percent margin resulted from fraud, including votes cast in the names of the thousands of dead people found on current voting rolls.

In retaliation, the government-dominated assembly has barred opposition lawmakers from public speaking and sitting on legislative committees.

Both sides planned to take to the streets of Caracas on Wednesday for marches celebrating International Workers' Day. Each appeared to be trying to avoid confrontation by choosing separate locations and calling for peaceful demonstrations, although fears of violence were running high.

Opposition candidate Henrique Capriles is boycotting an official audit of the election and plans to file a challenge seeking to overturn it in court.

On Tuesday, legislator Pedro Carreno, head of the governing United Socialist Party of Venezuela in the National Assembly, asked for an extension of the ban on public speaking by the opposition, whose members unfurled a banner reading "coup against the parliament."

"Without a word, like cowards, they came at us from behind," said Garcia, the opposition lawmaker.

Maduro accused the opposition of provoking the violence, which he condemned and called on the country to work out its disputes peacefully.

National Assembly chief Diosdado Cabello, considered one of the most powerful men in the country for his ties to the business community and army, has repeatedly defended barring opposition lawmakers from speaking. He said that if they don't recognize the legitimacy of the presidential election, they are casting doubt on the national electoral system that elected them, thus losing their own legitimacy.

The opposition lawmakers have also lost their seats on legislative commissions.

Carreno described government backers' action in the fight as self-defense.

"If I'm standing here and you come to attack me, it's likely that I'll react, but it's the aggressor who went out with a black eye," he said.

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Associated Press writer Michael Weissenstein contributed to this report.

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Kenya Supreme Court: Election was not perfect

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Kenya's Supreme Court on Tuesday said the execution of the nation's March presidential election wasn't perfect but that petitions to overturn the result did not prove President Uhuru Kenyatta was illegally elected.

The court had announced its unanimous ruling upholding Kenyatta's election in late March but on Tuesday released its 113-page written decision. The ruling said that petitions by former Prime Minister Raila Odinga and civil rights activist Gladwell Otieno do not disclose "any profound irregularity in the management of the electoral process."

Kenyatta beat seven other presidential candidates with 50.07 percent of the vote. That slim margin over the needed 50 percent was challenged by Odinga — who got 43 percent — and civil society groups that complained of anomalies in the voting process.

No major anomalies were found between the total number of registered voters and the total tally in the declaration of presidential election results, the court said.

"Although, as we find, there were many irregularities in the data and information-capture during the registration process they were not so substantial as to affect the credibility of the electoral process," the ruling said.

Kenya held a largely peaceful election process, avoiding a repeat of the chaos that rocked the country following the flawed 2007 presidential election, when more than 1,000 people died in violent attacks.

But the March 4 election did not go smoothly. An electronic voter ID system intended to prevent fraud failed for reasons yet to be explained by the electoral commission. Vote officials instead used manual voter rolls.

After the polls closed, results were to be sent electronically to Nairobi, where officials would quickly tabulate a preliminary vote count in order to maximize transparency in light of the rigging allegations that dogged the 2007 vote. But that system failed, too. Election officials have indicated that computer servers overloaded but haven't fully explained the problem.

Odinga's lawyers had argued that the switch from electronic voter identification to manual voter roll was stage-managed to allow inflation of Kenyatta's votes to take him past the 50 percent threshold. The Supreme Court said Kenya's electoral commission had no choice but to turn to the manual registers, though it had major weaknesses.

The court recommended an investigation into the acquisition of the computer systems that failed during the voting process. The court said there was questionable conduct by members of the electoral commission during the acquisition of the systems, and that prosecution of the suspects could be in order.

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Pakistan's Musharraf disqualified from election

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistani judges on Tuesday disqualified Pervez Musharraf from running in the upcoming parliamentary election, a blow to the former military ruler who recently returned from self-imposed exile to make a political comeback, lawyers said.

Over a week ago, a judge in the remote northern district of Chitral gave Musharraf approval to run in the May 11 election, even though he was disqualified in three other districts for suspending the constitution and sacking senior judges while in power.

Pakistan's political system allows a candidate to run for multiple seats simultaneously.

Lawyers challenged the Chitral decision, and on Tuesday a three-member appellate tribunal at the high court in the main northwest city of Peshawar disqualified Musharraf from running in the district, said two of the lawyers who raised objections, Taufiq Asif and Rao Abdur Rahim.

Asif challenged Musharraf's candidacy because of his actions while in power, while Rahim said there were procedural flaws with the former military ruler's nomination.

Musharraf's lawyer, Ahmed Raza Kasuri, said he plans to appeal the ruling in the Supreme Court.

The tribunal's decision is one of the biggest blows in what has been a bumpy return for Musharraf after over four years in self-imposed exile.

Musharraf seized power in a military coup in 1999 and ruled for nearly a decade before he was forced to step down and left the country in 2008 because of growing discontent with his rule. He returned to Pakistan last month to stage a political comeback, but he has been met with low levels of public support, a variety of legal challenges and Taliban death threats.

The former military strongman was only met with a couple thousand people at the airport in the southern city of Karachi when his plane from Dubai landed on March 24, a sign of how little support analysts say he enjoys in the country. A few days later, an angry lawyer threw a shoe at Musharraf as he walked through a court building in Karachi.

Musharraf faces a variety of legal charges, including some related to the 2007 assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. He has not been arrested because he arranged pre-arrest bail before he arrived, a feature of Pakistan's legal system.

The Supreme Court is also hearing petitions from lawyers alleging Musharraf committed treason while in office, an offense that can be punished by death or life in prison.

Amid all of this, the Pakistani Taliban have threatened to assassinate Musharraf. The militants released a video the day before Musharraf returned to Pakistan saying they had set up a special death squad to target him.

There is also concern that attacks by the Taliban and other militants could hamper the upcoming election.

A bombing Tuesday in the country's southwest hit a convoy of vehicles carrying a candidate in the parliamentary election, killing four people and wounding six others, said Pakistani officials.

Sardar Sanaullah Zehri's convoy was passing over a bridge in Baluchistan province's Khuzdar district when a bomb was detonated by remote control, said local government official Abdul Sattar Mengal.

Zehri, the Baluchistan president of the Pakistan Muslim League-N party, was unharmed, but his brother, son and nephew were killed, along with a driver, said Megal.

Zehri's vehicle passed over the bridge safely because it had jammers that prevented the bomb from detonating, said another government official, Mohammad Akbar. But several vehicles traveling in the convoy were hit.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Baluchistan is home to both Islamic militants and nationalists who have been waging an insurgency against the government for decades, seeking greater autonomy and a larger share of the province's natural resources.

____

Associated Press writer Abdul Sattar contributed to this report from Quetta, Pakistan.

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Students, troops clash in Venezuela over election

Apr 15 (Reuters) - Leading money winners on the 2013 PGATour on Monday (U.S. unless stated): 1. Tiger Woods $4,139,600 2. Brandt Snedeker $3,137,920 3. Matt Kuchar $2,442,389 4. Adam Scott (Australia) $2,100,469 5. Steve Stricker $1,935,340 6. Phil Mickelson $1,764,680 7. Dustin Johnson $1,748,907 8. Jason Day $1,659,565 9. Hunter Mahan $1,553,965 10. Keegan Bradley $1,430,347 11. Charles Howell III $1,393,806 12. John Merrick $1,375,757 13. Russell Henley $1,331,434 14. Michael Thompson $1,310,709 15. Kevin Streelman $1,310,343 16. Bill Haas $1,271,553 17. Billy Horschel $1,254,224 18. ...

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Guinea: Opposition to protest election date

CONAKRY, Guinea (AP) — The Guinean opposition on Sunday called for a march to protest President Alpha Conde's announcement that elections will be held on June 30.

Opposition supporters will hold a peaceful demonstration in the capital, Conakry, on April 18 to protest the date of the elections, said Aboubacar Sylla, spokesman for the Guinean opposition.

"We are determinated to bar the way to any attempt of fraud perpetrated by the government. We will walk to express our dissatisfaction on Thursday to deal with this unilateral decision of the authority to set the date while negotiations are ongoing," said Sylla.

The presidential decree was read Saturday evening on national television following months of negotiations over the vote.

The West African country has not had a functioning parliament for four years, and it only held its first democratic presidential election in 2010. Disagreements over the electoral process already have spilled over into violent protests.

Originally the vote was scheduled for May 12, but the opposition said it was pulling out because of concerns over election procedures.

Guinea suffered decades of dictatorship and strongman rule before the 2010 vote. Ethnic tensions, however, have risen in the deeply impoverished country since the landmark election.

Guinea's 10 million people are among the world's poorest, even though the country has resources of diamonds, gold, iron and half the world's reserves of the raw material used to make aluminum.

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Zimbabwe groups: election intimidation building

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Elections in Zimbabwe are still months away, but already President Robert Mugabe's party is intimidating its opponents and threatening violence, human rights and pro-democracy groups say.

Witnesses say Mugabe's ZANU-PF party has begun deploying youth militia groups in some of its strongholds. A young mother in the Harare township of Mbare said militants of a pro-Mugabe youth group known as Chipangano, or "the brotherhood" in local slang, have started door-to-door visits in the neighborhood and told residents to attend night meetings where names and identity particulars of participants were written down.

"They are watching me every day," she said, refusing to give her name because she feared violent retribution.

If she doesn't go to the meetings with family members and friends her absence will be noted down on another list of suspected Mugabe opponents, she said.

Mugabe party officials say the logging of names is merely part of regular campaigning to keep supporters up to date with the party's activities in the runup to polling.

Rugare Gumbo, the party's spokesman, denied a campaign of intimidation was under way. He has accused Mugabe's opponents of making "sensational" allegations to garner sympathy in the face of electoral defeat.

"We have become more and more aware of their machinations," he said.

The independent Zimbabwe Peace Project, which monitors political intimidation and violence, reported in its latest bulletin Mugabe militants are also marking with stickers the homes of their supporters and new converts.

"There is no doubt those with stickers would be used to identify people (without them) who would then be victimized before and after elections," the group said.

Mugabe's party insists its members are free to display party loyalty and regalia during election campaigning, a common practice in most countries. But independent campaign monitors have reported rival fliers and posters being torn down and destroyed, mostly by militant youth groups.

Monitors representing both local and foreign rights groups say there is now burgeoning fear because Zimbabwe's elections have been marred by violence and alleged vote rigging since 2000, mainly by Mugabe's party.

Actual physical violence this time around has been comparatively limited so far but there has been an increase in police action against groups and individuals seen as Mugabe opponents, including the arrests on March 17 of Beatrice Mtetwa, Zimbabwe's most prominent human rights lawyer, and four senior staffers of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, Mugabe's main rival.

Mugabe is to announce an election date in consultation with the coalition partners, but it is bogged down in technicalities. Under the constitution, new elections must be held within 90 days of June 29, when the term of the current parliament expires and the body is automatically dissolved. Mugabe wants the poll as soon as possible. Tsvangirai says it would be late July at the earliest but it could come as late as September.

Mtetwa, held in jail for eight days, appeared briefly in a Harare court Wednesday on charges of obstructing justice that carry a penalty of a fine or up to two years imprisonment. Prosecutors said they were not ready to go to trial and the hearing was put off to Monday. She denies the charges and says she only demanded to see a police search warrant when officers combed through offices of Tsvangirai's communications unit searching for alleged subversive materials and then seized equipment and documents. She said her arrest was a ploy to intimidate democracy activists ahead of new elections.

The police force is generally loyal to Mugabe.

"There will be many more arrests to follow as we near elections. The police were all out to get me," said Mtetwa after her release on bail on March 25. "They wanted me to feel their might and power."

Legal experts dismiss the charges against Mtetwa as spurious, but right groups also warn that more such arrests can be expected.

"We will see more of these kinds of tactics to criminalize key activists. It is a ZANU-PF strategy they are unlikely to stop," said McDonald Lewanika, director of Zimbabwe Crisis Coalition, an alliance of independent rights and civic groups. Lewanika's alliance also alleged that villagers where harvests had failed were made to take part in activities of Mugabe's party in order to receive food aid and school places for their children.

Underscoring how security forces operate with impunity, the African Union's Commission on Human and People's Rights on March 23 said Gabriel Shumba, a well-known human rights lawyer, was arrested in Zimbabwe in 2003 while meeting with a client and was then tortured. Police and intelligence agents threatened Shumba with death, and subjected him to electric shocks, the commission reported, adding that Shumba was doused in chemicals and became incontinent, he vomited blood and was forced to drink his vomit. It said Zimbabwe failed to open an official investigation into Shumba's "torture and trauma" and that it should now do so and prosecute those responsible.

For a decade, rights groups have campaigned to bring to justice perpetrators of political killings, torture, rape, assault, death threats, the destruction of homes and the looting of livestock and property surrounding a series of past elections. At least five groups belonging to the alliance have been targeted this year, with several activists arrested and alleged to have broken a range of security and criminal laws. None has yet been convicted.

Lewanika said police and other security services apparently intend to "disable groups that have a clear presence on the ground" which will leave communities vulnerable to threats of a return to the violence seen before and after the 2008 polls.

"This could have a huge and telling impact on voting. At this stage, we think there will be rampant fear affecting the vote," he said.

Mugabe, 89, led the nation to independence from colonial-era rule in 1980 and ruled virtually unchallenged until Tsvangirai, 60, founded his urban and labor based opposition Movement for Democratic Change in 1997. Mugabe's party suffered setbacks at polls that followed and in 2000 he ordered the often violent seizures of thousands of white-owned commercial farms crippling the agriculture-based economy of the former regional breadbasket.

Mugabe said he was correcting colonial imbalances in land ownership by the descendants of British and South African settlers so as to hand over farms to impoverished black Zimbabweans. But most prime farms went to his party elite and loyalists and many still lie idle.

The nation now depends on food imports and the United Nations estimates that 1.5 million Zimbabweans are currently in need of emergency food handouts.

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Election dispute big test for Kenya's top judge

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Confidence was so low in Kenya's courts after its 2007 election that people preferred to settle their disputes with machetes and bows and arrows. After this year's disputed presidential vote, there has been no violence, in part because of the faith the country has in its highest-ranking judge.

Chief Justice Willy Mutunga will soon preside over the biggest case of his short judicial career. Last weekend the country's election commission named Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta the winner of the March 4 presidential election with 50.07 percent of the vote.

Prime Minister Raila Odinga is challenging that result, saying there has been massive rigging. Odinga's camp said Tuesday that the prime minister was cheated out of 1.8 million votes, a margin that would give him an outright win.

The March 4 election was the first since postelection violence killed more than 1,000 people in 2007-08. This postelection period has not seen any violence. Odinga asked his supporters for calm, and Kenyans seem to have more faith in their government.

Mutunga on Monday said the election case would be heard "impartially, fairly justly and without fear, ill-will, prejudice or bias and in accordance with our constitution and our laws."

Mutunga's career as a social and political activist has placed him near Kenya's top politicians for decades, and he's shared his opinion on them. One quote from the 2006 book "Raila Odinga: An Enigma in Kenyan Politics" may become an issue for the case he soon presides over.

"I am convinced Kenya's transition needs Raila as the president of this country," author Babafemi A. Badejo quotes Mutunga as saying.

Mutunga has been "a committed activist in the pro-democracy movement in Kenya since the 1970s," according to a biography posted on a Kenyan government website.

Unlike other judges in Kenya, many who know Mutunga believe his independence is genuine, and is unlikely to be persuaded by bribes or threats. Mutuma Rutere, of the Nairobi-based Center for Human Rights and Policy Studies, said fairness is Mutunga's "biggest asset."

"There is enough evidence that he can be depended upon to preside over this issue in an independent manner," said Rutere, who worked with Mutunga at the Kenya Human Rights Commission. "His whole life has been about promoting justice and democracy."

Mutunga knows Odinga well. In the late 1970s, as former Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi consolidated his hold on power, Mutunga was jailed in 1982, the same year Odinga was detained for alleged treason. Later the two joined a pro-democracy group called the Young Turks.

In the book "Raila Odinga," Mutunga is quoted as saying Odinga "is a nationalist and a patriot. He has always struggled against dictatorship and oppression and been for social justice."

"Though it may sound contradictory, he is also an ethnic baron. He has not sorted out this contradiction in his life. He uses both nationalist and ethnic cards for the advancement of his political projects," the book quotes Mutunga as saying.

Kenya's 2010 constitution was passed in the wake of the 2007-08 tribal violence. It gives Odinga until Saturday to file his election petition and Mutunga's court two weeks to rule. Kenyatta cannot be sworn in until the case is closed.

On Tuesday, Odinga's team said it is seeking an order from Kenya's High Court to compel the election commission to produce electoral registrars and other documents used in the vote count. Odinga's team says the documents can help prove Odinga was cheated out of 1.8 million votes. It said the election commission is operating under a cloak of secrecy.

"This is a serious indictment on the integrity, ability and above all honesty of the" election commission, Education Minister Mutula Kilonzo said.

Though Mutunga has a reputation for fairness and independence, the Odinga case will present new, difficult tests in a country with a history of extra-judicial executions and unexplained disappearances. Even before Kenyans voted, a letter attributed to a violent gang circulated throughout the country warning of "dire consequences" if Kenyatta was blocked from running.

Kenyatta faces charges of crimes against humanity at The Hague-based International Criminal Court, and his eligibility to run for president was being tested in court.

"If anybody, any candidate, any party, any agency, or any other actor thinks that it will bend the ear, mind and resolve of this chief justice to do anything that is unconstitutional or illegal, then they are mistaken," Mutunga said in statement in February.

Mutunga, 65, was born into a poor family among the Kamba people of Kenya's eastern province and has degrees from universities in Kenya and Tanzania. He has taught constitutional law at the University of Nairobi. After his 1983 release from prison he went into exile in Canada, where he earned a doctorate in law at Toronto's York University.

He returned to Kenya in the early 1990s. Before being named chief justice, he had never been a judge. He has spoken out in defense of homosexuality in a deeply conservative society and is described as a proponent of "neoliberal" judicial reform. He wears a stud in his left ear, an item that became a publicly debated issue as he was named chief justice.

Out of 10 contenders for the job, Mutunga's name was the only one forwarded by the Judicial Service Commission to President Mwai Kibaki. Mutunga's appointment was approved by lawmakers in June 2011.

Gladwell Otieno of the Africa Center for Open Governance, a pro-democracy group in Nairobi, said Mutunga has been a good chief justice. She notes that he is one of only six justices, however. A seventh seat is vacant, opening the possibility of a split decision.

"Ever since he took over the judiciary public confidence has been rising steadily. It's quite high now," Otieno said. Odinga supporters "may expect him to rule in their favor... but he's not alone there and it depends on the quality of evidence they present."

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Associated Press reporter Tom Odula in Nairobi, Kenya contributed to this report.

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Hand-picked Chavez successor registers in election

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Hugo Chavez's hand-picked successor turned the nation's electoral commission into a stage for a massive campaign rally Monday, bringing thousands of cheering, crying, music-playing supporters with him as he registered his candidacy in an April 14 vote to replace the dead president.

The massive crowd blocked opposition candidate Henrique Capriles from registering by the deadline at 2 p.m. local time, and he asked election officials to extend the registration period.

Thousands applauded from a plaza outside the National Election Commission, waving banners and holding up posters of Chavez. Many wore the red shirts and baseball caps of Chavez's ruling Socialist Party, letting out a loud cheer when acting President Nicolas Maduro arrived to sign his election papers.

Some cried as Maduro saluted them from the building's balcony, eulogizing Chavez once again as Venezuela's "father redeemer" and asking God to give him "the wisdom to allow me to carry out the orders he gave us."

Later, he launched into a speech of more than two hours in the plaza outside the building, introducing his longtime partner, Attorney General Cilia Flores, and their children and grandchildren to the crowd.

"I am not Chavez, but I am his son, and all of us together, the people, we are Chavez," he said.

Opposition supporters denounced the carefully stage-managed event as an affront to basic electoral fairness. The electoral commission is meant to play an impartial role ensuring the vote is fair and free.

Campaigning doesn't officially start until April 2, but already the two sides are at each other's throats.

Capriles announced his candidacy Sunday, while blasting Chavez's top lieutenants for trying to use the president's death to stoke passions and tilt the election.

"You are playing politics with the president's body," he said, adding that he wasn't convinced the government had been honest about when Chavez died, and had lied to the people during his long illness by insisting he would get better. The government says Chavez succumbed to cancer on Tuesday after a nearly two-year battle. It has offered almost no clinical information.

Capriles previously called Maduro a shameless liar and referred to him condescendingly as "boy."

Maduro appeared right after Capriles on state TV on Sunday, accusing "the losing, miserable candidate" of defaming Chavez and his family. He called Capriles a "fascist" who was trying to provoke violence by insulting the "crystalline, pure image of Commander Chavez."

During his speech, Maduro said Chavez's body would remain until Thursday at the military academy where it has lain in state. On Friday, it will be moved to the military museum Chavez employed as his headquarters during the failed 1992 coup, Maduro said.

He said the National Assembly would approve a constitutional amendment later this week to allow Chavez to be moved permanently to the National Pantheon, where the remains of early 19th century liberator Simon Bolivar are held.

By law, such a change to the constitution would have to be approved by voters.

It was unclear whether the body would still be put on permanent display, as Maduro had said it would be last week.

Analysts have voiced increasing concern about the angry rhetoric in a country that has become deeply divided during Chavez's 14 years in office, though most Caracas residents say such exchanges have been common.

Meanwhile, the administration of President Barack Obama on Monday expelled two Venezuelan diplomats in retaliation for Venezuela's expulsion of two American military attaches after Chavez died last week. U.S. officials say junior diplomats Orlando Jose Montanez Olivares and Victor Camacaro Mata were told to return home over the weekend and left the U.S. on Sunday.

Officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

Washington wants to repair ties with Venezuela but has made little headway so far.

Beyond the diplomatic tit for tat, Venezuelan officials have accused the U.S. of being responsible for Chavez's cancer and sought to rally anti-U.S. sentiment ahead of an April election for a new leader.

And in Cuba, revolutionary icon Fidel Castro broke his silence over the death of his protege and uber-ally, saying in an editorial published by Communist Party newspaper Granma that the island had lost its "best friend."

Cuba receives billions of dollars in oil a year from Venezuela at cut-rate prices, a huge boost its flagging economy.

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Associated press writers E. Eduardo Castillo in Caracas and Bradley Klapper in Washington contributed to this report.

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Paul Haven on Twitter: www.twitter.com/paulhaven

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Mining, China central issues in Greenland election

By Alistair Scrutton

NUUK (Reuters) - Voters in Greenland's capital will stream into the town's one polling station on Tuesday in a national parliamentary election in which mining, Chinese influence and the environment are core issues.

With sea ice thawing and new shipping routes opening in the Arctic, the former Cold War ally of the West has emerged from isolation as a geopolitical interest for governments seeking a share of untapped minerals and potential offshore oil and gas.

Prime Minister Kuupik Kleist, who in his youth hunted whales with a hand-held harpoon, has opened up Greenland to investors over the last four years.

The capital Nuuk has an art cinema, sushi bars, Thai restaurants and gleaming new office towers alongside older, grey Soviet-style housing estates.

Many of the 57,000 mostly Inuit inhabitants dotted along remote coastal towns and villages fear change has come too fast. Ice floes often are so thin that hunters can no longer use dog sledges.

And miners exploiting Greenland's resources may employ more foreigners than locals.

Revenues from mining may help wean self-governing Greenland off Denmark's roughly $600 million annual grant and lead to eventual independence. But they also bring worries of environmental damage to traditional hunting and fishing.

The main opposition leader Aleqa Hammond, who lost her father when young after he fell through ice on a hunting trip, has promised more taxes or royalties on foreign mining companies.

"Where is the voice of the people?" Hammond told Reuters last week. "People feel that the prime minister speaks on behalf of investors from outside."

The capital of 15,000 people overlooks a bay where whales can often be spotted. There are just two traffic lights and no roads or train links with the rest of the country - the only way in or out is by plane or boat.

Campaign posters vie with ice sculptures on the frigid main street for attention.

Polls show the results, which may not be known until late Tuesday night, could be close.

CHINESE INFLUENCE?

European Union officials have expressed concern about China's influence in Greenland, part of what some analysts say is a multi-pronged Arctic strategy by the world's most populous nation to secure needed resources.

One of the most controversial plans is a proposal for a $2.3 billion mining project by the British-based London Mining Plc near the capital Nuuk that could supply iron ore to China. Some 2,000 Chinese workers could be flown in for its construction.

Kleist's government passed a law that critics said allowed large companies to bring in cheap labor to work on construction projects. Hammond has promised to revise the law if she wins.

Another issue has been the mining of rare earths, essential in 21st century technology like smartphones. China currently has the lion's share of production.

Rare earths are often intertwined with uranium deposits. But Greenland is split over whether to jettison its zero tolerance policy on mining radioactive materials, which originates in Denmark. Kleist wants to keep the ban while Hammond would end it.

One rare earth deposit in southern Greenland, being explored by Australian-owned Greenland Minerals and Energy, could be one of the largest such mines outside of China.

"Everything is on hold for us with the election," said Ib Laursen, operations manager at Greenland Minerals and Energy.

(Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Kenyan church moves past painful election history

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The Rev. Joshua Kimuyu pointed where his church floor is broken and black, a scar from an attack five years old. More than 200 young men armed with crude weapons stormed the Africa Inland Church in Nairobi's sprawling Kibera slum and set a generator on fire.

The explosion tore through the roof, creating one of the most visible scenes of postelection violence after Kenya's disputed election of 2007.

The dark spot is a constant reminder of the church's vulnerability during national elections. But for Kimuyu there was no question of keeping its doors shut this Sunday, the day after Kenya's election commission announced the winner of the East African country's fiercely contested presidential election. This time, Kimuyu said, there was nothing to fear after the two leading candidates —winner Uhuru Kenyatta and loser Raila Odinga —pleaded for calm and unity.

"When presidential candidates spoke to the media, they kind of fueled the steam in the people," he said, looking back on the disputed election of 2007, when more than 1,000 people died in tribe-on-tribe violence. But this time, although the election was hotly contested and close, the candidates urged Kenyans to respect authority, and that appears to have made a difference, said Kimuyu.

Sunday was a day of peace in Kenya. No violence was reported. Only the most minor of disturbances were reported late Saturday in the hours after Kenyatta was named the winner.

Odinga, who called the election "tainted," vowed to press a case of election irregularities with the Supreme Court. But he asked that Kenyans love one another and remain at peace.

The election commission said Kenyatta, the son of Kenya's founding father, won last Monday's vote with 50.07 percent of ballots. Kenyatta stands accused by the International Criminal Court of helping direct some of the 2007-08 postelection violence in which tribes attacked each other with machetes and bows and arrows and the police shot protesters.

Five years ago, President Mwai Kibaki was hurriedly sworn in for a second term, even as Odinga said the election had been stolen. His supporters took to the streets.

At the time, the Africa Inland Church was targeted because it was believed to be patronized by the Kamba tribesmen of Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka, whose willingness to serve in Kibaki's government was seen as a betrayal by the opposition.

In the wake of the 2007-08 violence Kenyans passed a new constitution. That document says that President-elect Kenyatta cannot be sworn in before the court rules on the petition Odinga says he will file. If the court rules that Kenyatta did not cross the 50 percent mark, then Kenyans will vote in a run-off election between the top two finishers.

For Kimuyu this is tremendous progress from five years ago, when Odinga called for mass action.

"I think this is one of the things that have changed since the last election," Kimuyu said. "Odinga is an advocate of the new constitution."

In the run-up to this election, clerics and activists held rallies that preached peace and unity no matter the election result. That investment seems to have paid off, with some of the most hardened Odinga supporters saying he should concede for the sake of the country.

In the Kibera slum, an Odinga stronghold that saw some of the worst violence after the 2007 election, residents went about their business on Sunday morning. Stalls were open, and some young men even seemed more animated by European football than by the outcome of the election. In Kimuyu's church a choir sang as he got ready to deliver a sermon that he said would focus on what it means to be a responsible, lawful citizen.

"We never talk politics here," said Ericson Munyao, a long-time member of the church who was among the first to witness the 2008 attack. "We just tell them to vote wisely, not who to vote for. We simply preach peace."

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Trudeau would win next Canadian election for Liberals, poll shows

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Liberals would return to power in the next Canadian election if, as expected, they choose the son of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau to head the party, according to an opinion poll released on Friday.

The Forum Research poll showed the Liberals with Justin Trudeau as leader would be able to replace the Conservatives in power, albeit with a minority government, if an election were held today.

The center-left Liberals governed Canada for much of the 20th century, but fell to third place in the 2011 election. That left them behind the left-leaning New Democrats for the first time in history as the Conservatives turned their previous minority government into a majority one.

The Forum poll showed the Liberals under Trudeau would take 39 percent of the vote if an election were held now, compared with 32 percent for the Conservatives, and 20 percent for the New Democrats.

An election is not due until 2015, and the Conservatives have not yet ground Trudeau through their formidable advertising machine, making it impossible to predict if the poll figures will hold.

"Justin Trudeau continues to solidify his position at the top of the pops," the National Post newspaper, which ran the poll, quoted Forum President Lorne Bozinoff as saying.

Trudeau is a magnetic 41-year-old former teacher and ski instructor who has attracted 150,000 supporters to the Liberal Party during his leadership campaign, more than all the other leadership candidates combined. He heads into the April 14 convention as the heavy favorite.

His flamboyant father held power from 1968 to 1979 and again from 1980 to 1984. He died in 2000.

Justin Trudeau's popular support comes despite widespread doubts in Ottawa on whether he has the clout to become prime minister. He has given few specifics on how he would run Canada other than offering generic goals such as protecting and expanding the middle class.

The Conservatives will be sure to seize on some of his gaffes, such as saying he might consider joining Quebec separatists if Canada became too conservative.

'UNCRITICAL COVERAGE'

Conservative Party Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Trudeau had received "largely uncritical coverage" so far in the race, and that polls were irrelevant this far ahead of the election.

"Sooner or later if he becomes Liberal leader, he'll have to undergo a greater degree of public scrutiny, and that goes with the job," he told Reuters after a speech in Ottawa.

Forum said its latest poll numbers would give a Trudeau-led Liberal Party 149 seats in the House of Commons, compared with 115 for the Conservatives and 41 for the New Democrats.

A party needs 155 of the 308 seats in the House to get a majority that cannot be overturned by other parties, although the formula will change when more seats are added for the next election.

The poll showed support for the Liberals at 30 percent in response to questions that did not mention Trudeau, just behind the Conservatives at 31 percent, and ahead of the New Democrats at 27 percent.

A Nanos poll released on Thursday showed the Conservatives at 31.5 percent of committed voters, their lowest Nanos result since August 2009. Nanos has the Liberals at 29.1 percent and the New Democrats at 27.2 percent.

The automated Forum telephone poll surveyed 1,755 Canadians on Wednesday and Thursday. Forum says it has a margin of error of 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Nanos surveyed 1,000 Canadians by phone February 19 to 24, including 717 committed voters. The error margin on committed voters is 3.8 percentage points.

(Reporting by Randall Palmer; Editing by Janet Guttsman,; Peter Galloway and Peter Cooney)

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All eyes on Capriles as Venezuela election set

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Opposition leader Henrique Capriles must make what could be the most important decision of his political life, now that Venezuela's elections commission has called an April 14 vote to pick a successor to the late Hugo Chavez.

The 40-year-old state governor is expected to announce on Sunday whether he will run against Chavez's hand-picked successor, who's a heavy favorite amid lingering sympathy for the charismatic president.

The stakes are high: A defeat for Capriles just six months after he lost the presidential vote to Chavez would likely finish his political career. If he waits, a Chavista government might prove inept and give him a better shot in a later election.

On a personal Twitter page that bore all the rah-rah adornments of a campaign site, Capriles wrote Saturday afternoon: "I am analyzing the declaration of the (electoral commission setting the date) and in the next hours I will talk to the country about my decision."

Whoever the opposition runs, analysts say the election is the government's to lose. They also predict the next five weeks will up the nasty, heated rhetoric that began even before Chavez's death Tuesday after a nearly two-year fight with cancer.

Nicolas Maduro, who was named Chavez's vice president after the October election, was sworn in as this oil-rich country's acting leader Friday night and is expected to be the ruling party candidate. Opposition critics have called Maduro's ascension unconstitutional, noting the charter designates the National Assembly president as acting leader if a president-elect cannot be sworn in.

Angel Alvarez, a political science professor at the Central University of Venezuela, said Capriles is well aware that "the dice are loaded in favor of the government's candidate."

That means sitting out the race would make sense for Capriles, said David Smilde, an analyst with the U.S.-based think tank the Washington Office on Latin America.

"If he says he doesn't want to run I could totally understand that," Smilde said. "He is likely going to lose and if he loses this election he's probably going to be done."

If Capriles stays out, the opposition would be wise to run fresher faces such as Caracas Mayor Antonio Ledesma or Henry Falcone, governor of Lara state and one of just three opposition governors.

That would give the opposition an opportunity to clearly articulate its platform and vision without damaging its top star. Capriles garnered 44 percent of October's votes, which was the most anyone had ever won against Chavez.

"Really what this campaign would be about is allowing the opposition to put themselves in position for the future, to show that they have some ideas for the country," Smilde said.

The government so far has taken advantage of its incumbency and often acted above the law.

Maduro has enjoyed the explicit support of top military brass even though the constitution prohibits the armed forces from getting involved in politics. Even the April 14 election date set Saturday by the elections council violated requirements that the election be held within 30 days of Chavez's March 5 death.

The government also hasn't been shy about using its top political weapon — Chavez's epic persona and his socialist-leaning transformation of Venezuela.

Supporters have compared the former paratrooper to Jesus Christ and early 19th century Venezuelan liberator Simon Bolivar, and the government says his body will be embalmed and put on eternal display at a military museum on a hill overlooking the capital.

Edith Palmeira, a 47-year-old Caracas resident, said Saturday that she would vote for Maduro, but was clear that her allegiance was based purely on her love of Chavez.

"Imitations are never as good as the original," Palmeira said. "But I think he must have grown as a person during so much time at the president's side. He must have learned to be a president."

Elvira Orozco, a 31-year-old business owner, said she planned to sit out the vote to protest Maduro's swearing-in.

"Here, they violate the constitution and no authority says anything," Orozco said.

Venezuela's deep political divide may be widening. Half the country remains in a near frenzy of adulation and mourning. The other half feels politically targeted.

"It is the cult of the adored leader, an escape from reality," said Vicente Gonzalez de la Vega, a law professor at Caracas' Metropolitan University. "They are trying to impose on the rest of the country a new pagan religion."

He said the ruling party was playing with fire with its strong nationalistic rhetoric by implying a vote against Maduro was somehow subversive.

Capriles, too, has heated up his speeches. On Friday he called Maduro a shameless liar, and condescendingly referred to him as "boy."

Opposition figures express concern about the election's fairness, especially given senior military officials' public vows of allegiance to Chavez.

There is no indication, though, that the opposition would sit out the vote.

A boycott of 2005 legislative elections was widely seen as disastrous for the opposition. In possession of every single seat, Chavez's camp was able to extend its hold on government, including stacking the Supreme Court with loyalists.

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Associated Press writers Frank Bajak, Paul Haven, Jorge Rueda and Vivian Sequera contributed to this report.

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Venezuela sets presidential election for April 14

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelans will vote April 14 to choose a successor to Hugo Chavez, the elections commission announced Saturday as increasingly strident political rhetoric begins to roil this polarized country.

The constitution mandated the election be held within 30 days of Chavez's March 5 death, but the date picked falls outside that period. Critics of the socialist government already complained that officials violated the constitution by swearing in Vice President Nicolas Maduro as acting leader Friday night.

Some people have speculated Venezuela will not be ready to organize the vote in time, but elections council chief Tibisay Lucena said the country's electronic voting system was fully prepared.

Lucena announced the date on state television while a small inset in the picture showed people filing past Chavez's coffin at the military academy in Caracas, where his body has lain in state since Wednesday.

Chavez's boisterous state funeral Friday often felt like a political rally for his anointed successor, Maduro, who eulogized him by pledging eternal loyalty and vowing Chavez's movement will never be defeated. Maduro is expected to run as the candidate of Chavez's socialist party.

Ramon Guillermo Aveledo, coordinator of the opposition coalition, immediately followed the election announcement by offering his bloc's presidential candidacy to Henrique Capriles, the governor of Miranda state who lost to Chavez in October. A Capriles adviser said the governor would announce his decision Sunday.

David Smilde, an analyst with the U.S.-based Washington Office on Latin America, said the opposition needs to run a candidate in the presidential election even though he believes it will almost certainly lose.

Smilde said he wasn't sure Capriles will accept the candidacy.

"If he says he doesn't want to run I could totally understand that," Smilde said. "He is likely going to lose, and if he loses this election, he's probably going to be done."

In that case the opposition would be wise to run someone such as Caracas Mayor Antonio Ledesma or Henry Falcone, governor of Lara state and one of just three opposition governors, he said.

That would give the opposition an opportunity to clearly articulate its platform and vision.

"Really what this campaign would be about is allowing the opposition to put themselves in position for the future, to show that they have some ideas for the country," Smilde said.

In his speech after his swearing-in Friday, Maduro took shots at the United States, the media, international capitalism and domestic opponents he often depicted as treacherous. He claimed the allegiance of Venezuela's army, referring to them as the "armed forces of Chavez," despite the constitution barring the military from taking sides in politics.

The opposition has denounced the transition as an unconstitutional power grab, while the government moves to immortalize Chavez. Since his death, the former paratrooper has been compared to Jesus Christ and early-19th century Venezuelan liberator Simon Bolivar, and the government announced that his body would be embalmed and put on eternal display.

Edith Palmeira, a 47-year-old Caracas resident at a park Saturday in central Caracas, said she would vote for Maduro, but made clear her allegiance was based purely on her love of Chavez.

"Imitations are never as good as the original," Palmeira said. "But I think he must have grown as a person during so much time at the president's side. He must have learned to be a president."

Elvira Orozco, a 31-year-old business owner, said she planned to sit out the vote to protest Maduro's swearing-in Friday.

"What they want is to say that here there's a democracy, but here they violate the constitution and there's no authority who says anything," Orozco said.

Observers voiced mounting concern about the deep political divide gripping Venezuela, with half of it in a near frenzy of adulation and the other feeling targeted.

"Everything that happened yesterday (with the funeral and Maduro's speech) are outward signs of a fascistic aesthetic, complete with armbands," said Vicente Gonzalez de la Vega, a professor of law at Caracas' Universidad Metropolitana. "It is the cult of the adored leader, an escape from reality. ... They are trying to impose on the rest of the country a new pagan religion."

He said the ruling party was playing with fire with its strong nationalistic rhetoric and the implication that a vote against Maduro was somehow subversive.

Capriles, too, has used emotionally charged language in his public comments. On Friday he denounced Maduro as a shameless liar who had not been elected by the people, and condescendingly referred to him as "boy."

Opposition figures have said they are concerned about the election's fairness, particularly given the public vows of allegiance to Chavez from senior military officials. Capriles lost to Chavez in Oct. 7 elections, but he garnered 45 percent of the vote, which was the most anyone had ever won against the late president.

A boycott of 2005 legislative elections was widely seen as disastrous for the opposition, letting Chavez's supporters win all 167 seats and allowing him to govern unimpeded by any legislative rivals.

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Associated Press writers Frank Bajak, Jorge Rueda and Vivian Sequera contributed to this report.

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Paul Haven on Twitter: www.twitter.com/paulhaven

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