SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) -- Former leftist rebels-turned
                   politicians have for the first time won a greater number of seats in
                   congress than the ruling party, according to final results from recent elections.

                   The Supreme Electoral Tribunal announced Saturday that the Farabundo
                   Marti National Liberation Front won 31 of the 84 contested seats in March
                   12 elections for the country's single-house National Assembly. The ruling
                   Nationalist Republican Alliance won 29 seats.

                   The results represent an increase of four seats for the Liberation Front, or
                   FMLN, and no change for the Republican Alliance, or ARENA.

                   The March 12 election marks the first time the ex-guerrillas have achieved a
                   higher number of seats than the ruling party. The leftists have now
                   participated in four elections since signing a 1992 peace accord, ending a
                   12-year civil war that left 76,000 people dead.

                   The party's victory does not imply a majority in congress, however: The
                   conservative National Conciliation Party, which works closely with the
                   government, won 14 seats -- enough to keep rightists in control of the
                   Assembly.

                   The center-left Democratic Center Union won three seats, the Christian
                   Democratic Party, five, and the recently founded National Action Party,
                   made up of ex-Army fighters, two.

                   The results signify a dramatic rebound for the FMLN, which was trounced in
                   last year's presidential voting by Francisco Flores of ARENA, which has
                   governed the country for more than a decade.

                   The leftist party's greatest triumph was in the capital, San Salvador, where
                   FMLN Mayor Hector Silva, a Boston-born gynecologist, easily won
                   re-election.

                   Altogether, the FMLN won 77 of 262 mayoral races, 60 percent more than
                   the 48 mayoral seats it won in 1997. ARENA won 127 mayoral seats, 34
                   less than the 161 it took in 1997.

                    Copyright 2000 The Associated Press.