Zimbabwe's Electoral Commission says President Emmerson Mnangagwa has won Monday's election as the ruling party maintains control of the government in the first vote after the fall of longtime leader Robert Mugabe.
Mnangagwa received 50.8 percent of the vote while the main opposition challenger, Nelson Chamisa, received 44.3 percent.
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission Chairwoman Priscilla Chigumba made the announcement early Friday.
"Therefore, Mnangagwa, Emmerson Dambudzo, of ZANU-PF party is therefore duly declared elected president of the Republic of Zimbabwe, with effect from the third of August, 2018."
Opposition spokesman Morgan Komichi said that his MDC party rejected the vote result.
"The results that have been announced have not been verified by us. I did not sign those results, so the results are fake."
While election day was peaceful in a break from the past, deadly violence on Wednesday against people protesting alleged vote rigging reminded many Zimbabweans of the decades of military-backed repression under Robert Mugabe.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is in Malaysia, the first stop of an Asian tour expected to focus on promoting free trade and pressuring North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.
During his visit, Pompeo will press countries to keep up pressure on Pyongyang via sanctions, according to a senior State Department official who briefed reporters during the flight to Kuala Lumpur.
Since President Donald Trump met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June, U.S. officials have been optimistic that Pyongyang would give up its nuclear weapons, though there is no evidence that the North has begun that process.
For more on these stories and the rest of day's news, visit our website voanews.com. This is VOA news.
Top U.S. national security leaders made a rare joint appearance in the White House briefing room Thursday to express concern about efforts by Russia and potentially others to meddle in U.S. elections.
AP's Warren Levinson has the details.
Amid complaints the White House has gone easy on Russian efforts to disrupt American elections, ??? security and intelligence officials told reporters "We're aware of the threat and we're pushing back."
"We continue to see a pervasive messaging campaign by Russia to try to weaken and divide the United States."
Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats says the efforts isn't as robust as it was two years ago but cautioned it's just a click away from becoming so.
National security adviser John Bolton claimed Trump warned Vladimir Putin about interference at their meeting in Helsinki, the one in which Trump appeared to accept Putin's details.
I'm Warren Levinson.
The World Health Organization says expert staff and equipment have been sent to northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo to quick-start the process of combating a new outbreak of Ebola. The latest outbreak occurred in North Kivu province, 2,500 kilometers away from Equateur Province, the site of the previous outbreak
WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic says that having people and material in the country from the outbreak in Equateur is very helpful in tackling the new outbreak.
"It is, on the other hand, very worrying that this area is a conflict zone. It is an area with lots of displacement, so the access can be hampered in that way."
The virus was discovered in a village near the city of Beni in North Kivu, which hosts more than one million displaced people. The province shares borders with Rwanda and Uganda, with a lot of cross border movement due to brisk trade.
The U.N. special envoy to Yemen is planning to invite the warring parties to Geneva on September 6 to discuss a framework for peace talks.
Martin Griffiths told the Security Council Thursday "a political solution" to end the war in Yemen is "available," and he urged world powers to support the new push for peace.
"These consultations will provide the opportunity for the parties, among other things, to discuss the framework for negotiations, to agree on relevant confidence-building measures and specific plans for moving process forward."
His announcement came just hours after the Saudi-led coalition conducted airstrikes in the rebel-held port city of Hodeida, killing at least 28 people and wounding at least 70.
And Apple made history Thursday when it became the first publicly listed U.S. company to be valued at $1 trillion.
The Silicon Valley company's stock has skyrocketed more than 50,000 percent since it went public.
For more, visit our website. I'm David Byrd, VOA news.
