Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez Has Died, Vice President Says

Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez, has died, Vice President Nicolás Maduro announced in a televised statement.

Chávez was 58.

Chávez, who had been in power since 1999, had become an icon of socialist policies in Latin America. With his country's oil wealth as backup, he launched fierce and unyielding criticism of the United States.

Chávez was battling cancer when he won a tough reelection campaign last year.

As we reported earlier, Maduro called a meeting of top Venezuelan politicians today and he asked the country to keep working, despite Chavez's ailment.

Maduro said history would judge Chávez as a "new liberator."

"That's what Chávez means to us and to our history; our Chávez is the 21st Century liberator," Maduro said during a press briefing.

This is a breaking news story. We'll update when we have more.

Copyright 2013 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.