Colombians headed to the polls Sunday in the first round of a presidential election, with a leftist poised for victory for the first time in the country's troubled history.
The vote takes place in a tense atmosphere, a year after a brutal security crackdown on street protests that were fuelled by deepening socioeconomic woes. Polls show that many Colombians are pinning their hopes on Gustavo Petro, an ex-guerrilla and former mayor of Bogota, to address poverty, rural violence, urban crime and endemic corruption.
