Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian claims victory in close race for re-election after surviving an assassination attempt.

President Chen Shui-bian claimed victory in a close race for re-election Saturday after surviving an assassination attempt, but his opponent challenged the results and raised questions about the shooting and its effect on voters.

While claiming victory in the presidential contest, Chen clearly lost a simultaneous referendum to strengthen Taiwan's military. The ballot question ? fiercely opposed by China, which saw it as a rehearsal for a vote on Taiwan independence ? failed because not enough voters participated.

Protests erupted around the island, as thousands took to the streets demanding that officials investigate alleged irregularities in the election, which Chen won by only 30,000 votes.

Riot police were deployed as the government tried to head off a political crisis that could pose a serious challenge to Taiwan's young democracy, which has had only two other direct presidential elections in the past eight years.

Crowds became violent in the third-largest city, Taichung. Hundreds of people pushed over a metal barrier at a courthouse, shoved their way through a police line and began smashing windows with their bare hands. Many chanted, "Check the ballots!" as police tried to restore order.

The hot tempers and scuffles were part of two days of political drama that began with an attempt to assassinate Chen and Vice President Annette Lu as they campaigned in southern Taiwan. A bullet grazed Chen's stomach and Lu was hit in the knee as they rode in a Jeep. Neither was seriously injured, and police have not identified any suspects.

Before the election, challenger Lien Chan said he trusted that Taiwanese voters would be rational and not let the shooting cause them to cast a sympathy vote for Chen. But after he lost the election, Lien changed his mind.

"This was an unfair election," Lien told a crowd outside his campaign headquarters.

Some have suggested that Chen's shooting was staged to swing the election in his favor.

"The gunshots looked very fishy," said Su Chi, a senior campaign official.

Lien did not go that far, but he demanded a full investigation of the attack's effect on the election. He also said 330,000 invalid ballots should be inspected.

Lien demanded that the Central Election Commission seal all ballot boxes in the 13,000 polling booths around the island so a recount could be done.

His running mate, James Soong, added, "There are clouds of suspicions around this election." Wen Yao-yuan, a high court judge, said 21 courts around the island were authorized to handle the sealing of ballot boxes.

"As long as the courts have certain evidence, not necessarily concrete evidence, they'll handle it," Wen said.

The assassination attempt was being treated as a criminal case and not a conspiracy or an attack that involved China, prosecutor Wang Sen-jung said Saturday.

Chen won the presidential ballot with 50.1% of the vote, the Central Election Commission said. Lien of the Nationalist Party came away with 49.9%. About 13 million ballots were cast. Turnout was 80%, the commission said.

Although Chen won, the referendum he was pushing failed because many voters decided to boycott it.

The ballot asked whether the island should step up defenses against China and seek talks with Beijing. China and Taiwan split amid civil war in 1949, and China wants the island to rejoin the mainland.

Beijing has threatened to attack if Taiwan seeks a permanent split.

The opposition Nationalist Party argued that Chen did not have the legal authority to call the referendum and successfully rallied most people to skip the vote.

Chen shrugged off the defeat in his victory speech, saying people did not seem to understand the referendum's contents. But he appealed to China to respect the election.

"It is a new era for solidarity and harmony and a new era for peace across the Taiwan Strait," Chen said. "We sincerely ask the Beijing authorities across the strait to view the election results from a positive perspective, to accept the democratic decision of the Taiwanese people."

But Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office said in a statement the referendum failed because it went "against the will of the people," China's state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

"Any attempt to separate Taiwan from China is doomed to failure," the office said.

It would have been hard to find candidates more different than Lien and Chen.

Chen, 53, grew up in a poor village and graduated from Taiwan's top law school. He got into politics by defending dissidents during the martial law era, which ended in 1987. He has been a legislator and Taipei mayor.

Lien, 67, belongs to one of Taiwan's richest families. The former political science professor served as an ambassador, foreign minister, premier and vice president in the former Nationalist government.

A glance at the two contenders

Chen Shui-bian, 53. Four years ago, Chen made history by becoming the first opposition candidate to win a presidential election in Taiwan. It was an amazing success story for the 53-year-old man, whose father was a poor sugarcane factory worker and whose mother was an illiterate day laborer. Chen started out as a maritime lawyer before being recruited to defend dissidents before martial law ended in 1987. He went on to serve as a Taipei city councilor, parliament member and Taipei mayor. When he ran for president in 2000, his opponents warned that he would start a war with China. Chen's Democratic Progressive Party has never endorsed China's sacred goal of unification. Chen and his vice president, Annette Lu, were shot and slightly wounded Friday while campaigning for the election. Lien Chan, 67. The former political science professor, finished a distant third in his first presidential bid in 2000. He has been foreign minister, premier and vice president, and he seems to have spent most of his career waiting to be president. Saturday's vote will likely be his last shot at his ultimate ambition. Lien's Nationalist Party has long supported China's sacred goal of uniting the two sides, after the Communists took over the mainland in 1949. It means a lot to Beijing that Lien has never pushed for independence, unlike the incumbent, who has never endorsed unification.

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