To: gilbert leblanc who wrote (411 ) 11/6/2001 1:37:09 PM From: Stephen O Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 545 Ortega Concedes Defeat in Nicaragua's Presidential Election 2001-11-05 15:13 (New York) Managua, Nicaragua, Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Former Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega conceded defeat in Nicaragua's presidential election, Agence France Presse and Deutsche Presse-Agentur said. In early returns from yesterday's vote, Enrique Bolanos, the former vice president under President Arnoldo Aleman, had 53 percent of the vote to Ortega's 45.4 percent, AFP and DPA said. While the final tally isn't expected until about 5 p.m. Washington time, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who had been in the country observing the vote, has paid a visit to Bolanos' campaign headquarters, AFP said. In the run-up to the vote, the U.S. criticized Ortega and his Sandinista party, which took power in 1979 and ran the country until 1990. ``We continue to have grave reservations about the FSLN's (Sandinistas') history of trampling civil liberties, violating human rights, seizing people's property without compensation, destroying the economy and ties to supporters of terrorism,'' the State Department said last month. The U.S. funded Contra rebels sought to overthrow the Sandinistas from 1981-1990. At least 40,000 people died in the civil war. The U.S. opposed Sandinista land-redistribution policies, close ties with Cuba and the Soviet Union and Marxist ideology after the party overthrew the right-wing dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza and his two sons in 1979. The Somozas had run Nicaragua for 46 years. Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in the Americas, with a per capita annual income of about $430. In some areas of the country, 70 percent of the people are unemployed. --Todd Zeranski in Princeton (609) 750-4655, or at tzeranski@bloomberg.net, with reporting by Peter McGill in London, through the Washington newsroom