By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

          SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador -- Salvador's leftist former rebels
          claimed victory in election for mayor of the capital and said they
          expected gains in voting Sunday that would shift the balance of power in
          congress.

          Incumbent mayor Hector Silva of the Farabundo Marti National
          Liberation Front proclaimed victory in San Salvador -- the most
          important of 262 mayoral races in the nationwide elections.

          No significant results were yet in from voting for the 84-member
          congress, but earlier polls had showed the Front -- known as the FMLN
          -- poised to make gains there. Partial results were expected overnight,
          though final results could take up to two days.

          Apparently worried by poll results, President Francisco Flores earlier
          Sunday urged Salvadorans to vote against "those who opposed the
          establishment of our democracy." Flores' rightist Nationalist Republican
          Alliance party, known as ARENA, has governed the country for the past
          decade.

          Flores' comments outraged leaders of the FMLN, which became a
          political party following the January 1992 peace accord that ended a
          12-year civil war in which about 76,000 people died.

          "What President Flores is doing is prohibited; he is not acting as
          president. He is nothing more than a (party) campaign activist," said
          Schafick Handal, a former guerrilla commander who is seeking
          re-election to congress.

          But as the polls closed at 5 p.m., he expressed confidence that the
          FMLN and its center-left allies would make significant gains.

          "There will be a new balance of power in El Salvador," he said.

          Silva, a 53-year-old Boston-born gynecologist, claimed the first victory
          in the municipal and legislative voting. He told a news conference he had
          won a 57 percent to 39 percent victory over ARENA's Luis Cardenal.

          His victory three years ago in the capital was the biggest electoral boost
          the Front has yet achieved in the country.

          While the leftist party calls for halting the government's privatization
          program, it has also called for cutting taxes and tightening anti-corruption
          laws.

          Polls show the FMLN could boost its share of seats in the single-house
          congress to 30 or 32 from the current 27. Smaller center-left parties also
          may advance. Polls indicate ARENA could fall short of the 28 seats it
          now holds.

          Those polls are two weeks old, since law prohibits releasing polling data
          in the final 15 days before an election.

          Electoral officials said fewer than 50 percent of the 3 million eligible
          voters turned out to cast ballots for congressmen, mayors and 20
          representatives to the Central American Parliament. Eight parties were
          participating.
 

                     Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company