CANADA: Canada's Conservative leader, Stephen Harper, celebrated election victory yesterday promising lower taxes and better relations with Washington, but he fell far short of a parliamentary majority, limiting his ability to make radical changes.
The result, said political commentators, was more a rejection of the Liberal Party after more than 12 years in office increasingly tarnished by corruption scandals, than an enthusiastic endorsement of Mr Harper's free-market, pro-US stance.
The Conservatives won 124 of the 308 seats in the House of Commons.
The Liberals held 103, while the separatist Bloc Quebecois won 51 and the left-wing New Democratic party took 29. One seat went to an independent. Voter turnout, at 65 per cent, showed a moderate rebound in political interest among Canadians.
Prime minister Paul Martin handed his resignation to Canada's governor general and announced he would step down as head of the Liberal Party.
That triggered a leadership race with Michael Ignatieff, a former BBC presenter, author and human rights advocate - poised to enter after winning his west Toronto seat comfortably. "I don't know where the road leads from here," Mr Ignatieff told supporters at a victory party, "but it began here."
If he does enter the leadership contest he will face competition from, among others, Frank McKenna, ambassador to Washington, and Belinda Stronach, a recent defector from the Conservatives.
Mr Ignatieff's 27-year absence from Canada will count against him but his fame and the effective campaigning style he demonstrated in Toronto give him an outside chance.
"He's nicely situated," said John Fraser, head of Massey college at the University of Toronto. "He weathered the initial scorn [ over his entry into Canadian politics] with some style. He's an attractive figure and there is a paucity of really interesting political figures."
Mr Harper's victory marks a remarkable comeback for Canada's Conservatives, who were almost moribund a few years ago. His enthusiasm for market policies, support for the Iraq invasion, his antipathy to the Kyoto agreement on global warming and his backing for the US missile defence initiative, were all causes for satisfaction in the White House yesterday.
"We look forward to strengthening our relations and working with the new government," Scott McClellan, President George Bush's spokesman, said.
While Mr Harper's election is likely to lead to a better ambience at US-Canadian summits, the new political reality will limit the extent to which he will be able to shift Canadian foreign policy in a more pro-American direction. Popular opposition, for example, has forced him to mute his support for the Iraq war.
"In foreign policy, he is going to be quite limited," said Richard Gwyn, a columnist on the Toronto Star. "He can try to improve relations with the Americans but as long as Bush is president, it is politically toxic for a Canadian leader to be seen as being buddy-buddy with him."
Stephen Clarkson, political science professor at Toronto University, said Mr Harper had two years at most before being forced to call an election. "Anything he does in parliament will depend on getting support on the left," he said. "It is going to be dangerous for him to push anything too radical." - (Guardian service)