Hugo Chavez was re-elected by a large margin on Sunday. Leftists like him appear to have done quite well over the past year in Latin America:

* LEFTIST/CENTER-LEFT WINS:

-- VENEZUELA - With 78 percent of the vote counted, Chavez had 61 percent while his challenger Manuel Rosales, a governor from an oil-producing province, trailed with 38 percent.

-- BRAZIL - President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was re-elected in October with 60.8 percent of the vote against 39.2 percent for Geraldo Alckmin of the centrist Brazilian Social Democracy Party.

-- NICARAGUA - Daniel Ortega, former Sandinista guerrilla leader whose Marxist regime of the 1980s was plagued by a civil war fueled by the United States, won the presidency in November against conservative Eduardo Montealegre, by 38 percent to 29 percent.

-- BOLIVIA - Evo Morales of the Movement Toward Socialism won the presidency with 54.2 percent of the vote, while former president Jorge Quiroga received 28.6 percent.

-- CHILE - Michelle Bachelet, a Socialist in a center-left coalition, became the country's first female leader after winning 53.5 percent in January's election over opposition candidate Sebastian Pinera's 46.5 percent.

-- PERU - President Alan Garcia's beat Ollanta Humala by 52.6 percent to 47.4 percent. Garcia was more centrist than his radical rival but has well-established leftist credentials.

-- ECUADOR - In November, Rafael Correa won with about 57 percent of the vote while conservative Alvaro Noboa trailed by doubled digits, according to electoral authorities.