Keita re-elected Mali president

BAMAKO:Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has been re-elected for a five-year term after winning a landslide in a run-off ballot, according to official figures Thursday.

The elections have been closely watched abroad, as Mali is a linchpin state in the insurgency raging in the Sahel. Keita, 73, picked up 67.17 percent of the vote on Sunday against 32.83 for opposition challenger and former finance minister Soumaila Cisse, 68, who also ran against Keita in 2013, the government announced. Turnout was low, at 34.5%.

Cisse´s party angrily vowed to use contest the results, but using "all democratic means." Mali, a landlocked nation home to at least 20 ethnic groups where most people live on less than $2 (1.76 euros) a day, has been battling a years-long Islamic revolt that has now fuelled inter-communal violence. Hundreds of people have died this year alone, most of them in Mopti, an ethnic mosaic in central Mali, in violence involving the Fulani nomadic herder community and Bambara and Dogon farmers.