SAN JOSÉ: Costa Rica on Sunday voted for a former minister from the center-left ruling party as its next president, rejecting his rival, an ultra-conservative preacher who had campaigned strongly against gay marriage.

Carlos Alvarado, a former labor minister under current President Luis Guillermo Solis, who was barred from seeking a second term, won a convincing 60.7 percent of the ballots in the run-off, electoral authorities said, based on returns from more than 90 percent of polling stations.

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