Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro won elections for a new term, the country's electoral authority said earlier on Monday, but the United States and some Latin American countries questioned the legitimacy of the result after a vote in which the opposition expressed confidence it had won. Meanwhile, protests began in the capital and in several cities of the country.
The National Electoral Council released the results six hours after polls closed, saying Mr Maduro had received 51% of the vote compared to 44% for opposition candidate Edmundo González.
The result does not include vote counts from individual polling stations, which election observers said were vital to determining the accuracy of vote counts. The result also came as polls showed Mr González winning by a wide margin.
After the electoral council controlled by Mr. Maduro announced the result, residents around Caracas almost immediately and in the hours that followed began banging pots to protest the result.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said: “We have serious concerns that the announced result does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people.”
Nine Latin American countries called for an audit of the count data, with some leaders saying they would not recognize the election result until it was proven accurate.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, an early leader of the region's leftist movement, did not congratulate Mr. Maduro on claiming victory.
“The Brazilian government welcomes the peaceful nature of yesterday's elections in Venezuela and is closely following the counting process,” Mr Lula said in a statement. “In this context, it awaits the publication by the National Election Council of the data divided by voting centers, a necessary step for the transparency, reliability and legitimacy of the election result”.
Mr. Maduro told supporters from a stage, where he also danced to the music reggaeton, “What a beautiful day we lived. Thank you for giving me this victory that the people deserve. This is the triumph of the ideals of equality”.
Mr. Maduro claimed that the opposition was using an old tactic: alleging manipulation of the election it had lost.
“I have seen this film several times,” Mr. Maduro said.
He received support from leftist leaders in Cuba, Nicaragua, Russia, Bolivia and Honduras, who hailed his victory.
As voting drew to a close on Sunday afternoon, a poll conducted by Edison Research showed that Mr. González had won by a wide margin, receiving more than double the votes of Mr. Maduro. The opposition also had access to a rapid counting system, through tabulations from samples collected from polling stations, which was considered highly accurate. This system gave Mr. González about 8.5 million votes, 4.5 million more than Mr. Maduro.
Before the election, Mr. Maduro's regime arrested dozens of opposition campaign workers. The government, to curb voter turnout, allowed only 69,000 of the nearly 5 million voting-age Venezuelans who had moved abroad to cast their ballots.
Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado rejected the electoral authority's result, saying Mr González had actually won 70% of the vote.
Mr Maduro, speaking at a rally of supporters early on Monday, promised “peace and security”. He dismissed criticism from abroad by presenting Venezuela's electoral authority, which is controlled by loyalists of Mr. Maduro, as more legitimate than systems in other countries, such as the United States.
Chile's president, Gabriel Boric, called the election results “hard to believe.”
Mr. Boric said on the X network that the Venezuelan people and the international community demand full transparency of the vote and the counting process and that independent international observers verify the results.
The foreign ministers of Argentina, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay made a similar call in a joint statement, saying a transparent count is the only way to ensure the results of respect the will of the voters in Venezuela.
In Europe, Spain's Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares Bueno called for the publication of data from all polling stations and for people to maintain calm and a sense of civility.
The European Union's foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said access to voting data from polling stations was “vital” and that the will of Venezuelan voters “must be respected.”
Mr. Maduro received support from several allies after announcing his victory, including Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, who said he spoke with Mr. Maduro and congratulated him on a “historic electoral triumph.”
Honduran President Xiomara Castro congratulated Maduro and the Venezuelan people “for their indisputable triumph, which reaffirms their sovereignty.”
Bolivian President Luis Arce said his government welcomed “the fact that the will of the Venezuelan people at the ballot box has been respected.”
Mr. Maduro is in his second term as president, and Sunday's vote represented his toughest electoral challenge yet.
Mr. González is a retired diplomat who entered the election race in April after Venezuela's Supreme Court barred opposition leader Machado from running.
Some of the data for this article was obtained from the Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters news agencies.
