Bolivian vice-president takes over reins

New Bolivian President Carlos Mesa proposed holding early elections after he was sworn in, hours after his predecessor was forced out by weeks of bloody street protests set off by a plan to export natural gas to the US.

President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada stepped down yesterday when he lost the support of a key ally and his beleaguered government collapsed in the wake of the deadly demonstrations, which killed more than 65 people and marked Bolivia’s worst crisis since the country’s return to democracy in 1981.