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International Bolivia state TV’s Twitter account hacked

Bolivian President Evo Morales talks to journalists on July 3, 2013 at the airport of Schwechat, near Vienna. Helmut Fohringer/AFP/Getty Images

LA PAZ, Bolivia – The Twitter account of Bolivia’s state television was hacked Saturday on the eve of elections and used to issue a bogus tweet saying President Evo Morales had been gravely wounded in an assassination attempt.

Morales responded by appearing at a news conference in the Chapare region, where he was playing soccer with fellow coca-grower union leaders. He blamed the hoax on political opponents.

Bolivia’s first indigenous president is expected to handily win a third term Sunday and become Bolivia’s longest-serving leader.

The assassination attempt tweet was the first in a series of increasingly nonsensical tweets from the account. One said the United States was at war with Bolivia.

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