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The vote was boycotted by the opposition, which says the election is fraudulent and designed to secure a dictatorship by socialist President Nicolas Maduro.

The president said the new Constituent Assembly wouldend the country's debilitating political and economic crises.

But the vote has been overshadowed by deadly protests and the shooting deaths of a leading candidate and of a youth opposition leader.

Prosecutors believe multiple assailants broke into the house of Jose Felix Pineda, a 39-year-old lawyer, overnight and fired several shots at the candidate, killing him.

Read: What are Venezuela's proposed constitutional changes?

A regional secretary for the youth opposition party Democratic Action, Ricardo Campos, was also shot dead during a protest against the election in the northeastern town of Cumana, prosecutors said on Sunday.

In a statement released Sunday night, the US State Department said the new assembly appeared to have beendesigned to "undermine the Venezuelan people's right to self-determination."

"We will continue to take strong and swift actions against the architects of authoritarianism in Venezuela, including those who participate in the National Constituent Assembly as a result of todays flawed election," the US State Departmentsaid.

Gunmen on motorbikes

Protesterswearing hoods andmasks erected street barricades, whichsecurity forces quickly removed. Authorities said seven people diedin the various protests and the opposition said the true death toll was around a dozen people. That would make Sunday the deadliest day of protests since they broke out in April.

Prosecutors said a Venezuelan soldier was shot dead at a protest in the western state of Tachira, andtwo teenagers were killed at different protests in the same region.

In Caracas abomb exploded and injured seven police officers.

Losing legitimacy?

In what could be a sign of increasingly violent tactics, a makeshift bomb injured nine police officers.

The opposition estimated participation in the vote was just 7 percent by mid-afternoon, but warned that the government would likely announce that 8.5 million people had voted.

There are widespread reports Maduro and his loyalists had coerced the country's 2.8 million state workers into voting. Some two dozen sources told Reuters they were being threatened with dismissal andwere being blasted with text messages and phone calls asking them to vote and report back after doing so.

Only 23 percent of Venezuelans favor the new assembly plans, according to a June survey by polling firm Datanalisis.

State television showed Maduro casting the first vote in a west Caracas polling station."I'm the first voter in the country. I ask God for his blessings so the people can freely exercise their democratic right to vote," Maduro said alongside his wife, who is a candidate for the constituent assembly.

The power to dissolve Congress

The 545-member citizens' assembly will be tasked with rewriting the constitution and be empowered to dissolve the opposition-controlled Congress.

Congress has already been severely weakened by the Maduro-loyalist electoral commission and supreme court. The turnout result will be a key factor in giving the vote a facade of legitimacy.

The US, the EU, the Organization of American States, as well as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico opposed the election, warning it could decapitate Venezuela's democracy and lead to further unrest.

aw/jm(AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)

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Venezuela votes in election that opposition says will end democracy - Deutsche Welle