Bolivian President Exits Amid Uprising

A 73-year-old, U.S.-educated businessman and one of the wealthiest people in the country, Sanchez de Lozada was driven from office by an uprising of its poorest citizens, the Aymara and Quechua Indians who are the majority in the ethnically divided nation.

Arriving from La Paz's impoverished suburbs as well as dozens of surrounding towns and villages, the protesters cut nearly all the city's highway and air links, causing widespread food and fuel shortages and stranding hundreds of foreign tourists in this city of 1.4 million people.

"We are very happy today, but this is only the beginning," said Serafin Paco, a miner who marched to La Paz from the provincial town of Huanuni. "Now we have to fight for our salaries, so that we can all live in better conditions."

Having marched hundreds of miles in their hard hats to join the antigovernment protests in La Paz, Paco and other miners celebrated in its central plaza by setting off dynamite blasts.

In a resignation letter, accepted by a special session of Congress late Friday, Sanchez de Lozada said "seditious elements" employing violence had forced him to step down. He said he did not believe his resignation would bring a quick solution to the "profound causes of this crisis."

Bolivian television reported that Sanchez de Lozada left La Paz by helicopter Friday afternoon shortly after writing his letter of resignation. The same reports suggested that he was planning to board a flight to the United States.

Vice President Carlos Mesa, a 50-year-old journalist and historian, took the oath of office as president late Friday. Under the law, he may serve out Sanchez de Lozada's term, due to end in 2007, but Mesa said he favored a "clear and transparent" vote sooner than that.

Wearing the red, yellow and green presidential sash, Mesa addressed Congress after being sworn in and appealed for national unity, even as he acknowledged Bolivia's social woes. "Bolivia is still not a country of equals," he said. "We must understand our peoples, our Quechuas and Aymaras."