COLOMBO, Sri Lanka -- Sri Lanka's president was sworn in to a second term in office Wednesday after a narrow election victory that reflected voter discontent with her failure to end the war with Tamil separatists.
Chandrika Kumaratunga, her wounded right eye bandaged from an assassination attempt against her Saturday, renewed her pledge to work for peace and appealed to the minority Tamils to reject the Tamil rebels "and the violence and hatred they stand for.""There is no individual on this earth more determined than I am to end this country's wretched and mindless bloodshed and destruction," she said in a tearful address after a simple swearing-in ceremony at her official residence.
Elections monitors, meanwhile, said voting Tuesday was marred by flagrant violations and said results from Tamil regions should be thrown out completely because of fraud.
Kumaratunga won 51 percent of the vote in Tuesday's election, ahead of her nearest challenger, Ranil Wickremesinghe, who garnered 43 percent, Election Commission official D.N.P.B. Dassanayake said Wednesday.
The result was less than the landslide 62 percent Kumaratunga won in 1994, when she came into office promising to negotiate peace with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
The president called the latest election 11 months earlier than scheduled, seeking a broad mandate for her policy of trying to crush the Tamil rebels unless they accept her peace plan.
However, she was faced with voter discontent over a war that has become fiercer, with the army suffering heavy setbacks in fighting in the north last month.
Tamil rebels are waging a war for an independent homeland for the country's minority Tamils. An estimated 61,000 people have died in the 16-year-old insurrection, and 1.2 million have been made homeless in the island off India's southeast coast.
Tamils have a language, religion and culture distinct from that of the Sinhalese. The two groups have periodically fought over territory for 1,000 years.
A total of 11 candidates were in Tuesday's race, but the real contest was between Kumaratunga and Wickremesinghe, who had said he would open unconditional peace talks with the Tamil Tigers. Kumaratunga has proposed an autonomy plan.
Kumaratunga voted from her home on Tuesday, days after she was injured by a suspected Tamil rebel who blew herself up with explosives strapped to her body.
Speaking after she was sworn in, Kumaratunga said she was returning "from the threshold of death" to achieve her task.
"Look at my wounds. These are not the wounds of politics. These are not the wounds of a just fight for equality. These are the wounds of sheer naked, and unadulterated hatred of man for man. Those who inflict such wounds can no longer be allowed to go unchecked and unpunished," she said.
The Election Commission said 73 percent of the 11.7 million voters cast ballots, despite threats from Tamil rebels to disrupt the voting.
Jehan Perera, of the National Peace Council, said Wickremesinghe won strong support from Tamil-inhabited areas, which "shows that the Tamils have rejected the government's policy on the ethnic conflict."
The independent Center for Monitoring Election Violence said the poll was marred by serious election violations, systematic impersonations and ballot-stuffing.
"The result of this election has been irredeemably compromised," said the organization's director, Paikiyasothy Saravanamuttu.
In some areas, political activists snatched the election registration cards from voters and used them to cast ballots. Elsewhere, roads were blocked by tree trunks or burning tires to turn away would-be voters, said Dev Anand, a member of the monitoring center.
Because of irregularities, the monitors said the election should be nullified in the entire northeast region and polling should be held again. The northeast is the Tamil-dominated area, where the rebels want to carve out an independent Tamil state.
One monitor, Kingsley Rodrigo, said the center had received more than 350 complaints of election violations.
At least seven people died in election violence -- including three men thought to be Kumaratunga supporters killed by a grenade attack.