Colombian electoral body announces Senate vote recount

Colombia's top electoral body announced on Monday it was ordering a recount of votes from Senate elections earlier this month due to the large number of fraud accusations.

One of the main accusations came from former guerrilla Gustavo Petro, the main left-wing candidate for May's presidential election.

Petro claimed 500,000 votes for leftist candidates to both houses of parliament had not been counted after the March 13 election.

"Given the myriad inconsistencies in the ballot forms ... I will ask tomorrow for a new count of all the Senate" votes, registrar Alexander Vega said on Monday.

Vega faced criticism from all sides over the last week.

Petro's Historic Pact coalition of leftist parties achieved a record number of 40 seats across the two houses of congress, but they are expecting to gain even more after the recount.

Right-wing former president Alvaro Uribe, who heads the Democratic Centre party, said those results fomented "mistrust".

His party picked up just 30 seats after losing 21, leading Uribe to call for a recount.

Vega admitted there had been "human errors" by electoral juries resulting in "inconsistencies."

The Electoral Observation Mission NGO criticised the lack of training given to vote counters before the election while European Union observers said there was a problem with the vote counting format.

Colombians will head to the polls on May 29 to vote for a successor to President Ivan Duque, with a second round run-off on June 19 if there is no clear winner.