Salvadoran leftist leads presidential race (Miami Herald)

[Judi Lynn]

Posted on Sunday, 01.04.09
EL SALVADOR
Salvadoran leftist leads presidential race
The left-wing candidate in the March presidential election has been leading in polls in a polarizing El Salvador campaign.

BY LIZA GROSS
[e-mail]
SAN SALVADOR -- Sixteen years after failing to seize power in a bloody civil war, the left in El Salvador is closer than ever to achieving its goal through the ballot box, as a jittery nation witnesses a furious and dirty campaign to elect the next president.

All sides contending in the March 15 presidential race, as well as in January's municipal elections, agree that the hostile tone of the two main candidates and their supporters has worsened the polarization endemic to Salvadoran politics.

Mauricio Funes, 49, the candidate of the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN), is viewed by detractors as a communist who would throw El Salvador into chaos. His opponent, 44-year-old Rodrigo Avila of the Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA), is viewed by critics as a conservative who would champion the wealthy elite at the expense of the poor.

The election results will have repercussions for the United States, which was heavily involved in El Salvador's 12-year civil war that claimed an estimated 73,000 lives.

The United States poured in billions of dollars in aid and deployed military advisors to support the embattled right-wing government during the conflict. The U.S. Embassy in San Salvador, a fortresslike complex, remains a symbol of the special relationship between the two nations.

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http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/story/836783.html