ANDRES VIGLUCCI, JAY WEAVER AND FRANK DAVIES

 The arrival of Elian Gonzalez's father in the United States is ''imminent'' and the boy's Miami
 relatives have been told they must surrender custody soon after he lands, U.S. immigration
 authorities said Monday.

 On Monday evening, the U.S. State Department approved travel visas for six people: the
 father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, his wife, their 6-month-old boy, a favorite cousin of Elian's,
 and Elian's pediatrician and kindergarten teacher.

 State Department spokesman James Rubin said the visas could be issued as early as today
 by the U.S. Interests Section in Havana. Cuban President Fidel Castro has said a plane ''is
 ready'' and could leave Havana today.

 Whether Elian heads directly home to Cuba with his father or they wait out a U.S. court
 battle over the boy's fate remained undecided Monday night. That could be determined in
 negotiations between the Miami relatives and immigration authorities. Those talks adjourned
 without resolution Monday after nearly nine hours.

 INS officials and representatives for Elian's Miami relatives gathered this morning for
 another round of talks. The only subject for discussion is whether the Miami family will
 agree to turn over Elian to his father peacefully, a Justice Department official said.

 If they do, the official said, the government and an attorney representing Juan Miguel
 Gonzalez have agreed not to return the boy to Cuba immediately, but to await the
 outcome of the relatives' federal court battle to keep the boy here.

 ''I think they understand this transfer is going to happen no matter what,'' the official said.
 ''Our goal is to do this in the most cooperative way possible.''

 But Elian's cousin, Marisleysis Gonzalez, disputed that in an impassioned statement
 outside the family home at 11 p.m.

 ''What does this country want to do to Elian? Drive him crazy?'' she said, with tears
 on her cheeks. ''Let the father come to this house and be with his son and ask him how
 he feels.''

 Gonzalez, the surrogate mother for Elian, was taken to Coral Gables Hospital this
 morning after she grew faint and become ill during a round of early morning nationally
 televised interviews.

 After Gonzalez finished one interview at La Carreta, a Little Havana restaurant,
 she turned pale. She put her head in a friend's lap and then hurried into a
 bathroom.

 Minutes later, Miami fire-rescue paramedics arrived to treat her.

 Gonzalez will remain in the hospital overnight, said family spokesman Armando
 Gutierrez. Gonzalez was exhausted, he said.

 Gonzalez, a loan processor in her early 20s, had arrived at the interview at about
 6:30 a.m. Tuesday, after Monday night's news conference.

 Earlier this year, Gonzalez was hospitalized for exhaustion. Friends have also
 said she often spends days in bed, too tired to move.

 Meanwhile, the family's lawyer Kendall Coffey recommended an additional step in
 the custody proceedings.

 ''We propose an independent panel of three psychologists to do an evaluation of
 Elian and decide what would be in his best interest,'' Coffey said. ''This should
 have been done a long time ago.''

 DEADLINE SUPERSEDED

 Bob Wallis, the Immigration and Naturalization Service district director in Miami,
 said after the talks recessed that a 9 a.m. deadline today for revocation of Elian's
 legal permission to stay in the country had been ''superseded'' by the father's
 expected arrival.

 Instead, Wallis said at a news conference, the agency would begin transferring
 temporary custody from Elian's great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, once the boy's
 father arrives. But Wallis said the physical change of custody would not
 necessarily take place right away, raising the possibility of a period of transition
 between Juan Miguel Gonzalez's arrival and the actual reunification with his son.

 ''The transfer of parole care does not mean that the child will be immediately
 removed from the home of the great-uncle,'' Wallis said. ''Instead, it is our hope to
 begin a smooth and orderly process that will create as little disruption as possible
 for Elian.''

 He would not elaborate. Sources close to the talks, however, said both sides
 remained far apart.

 PLAN NOT DIVULGED

 The Justice Department official declined to discuss what the government would do
 if the Miami relatives refuse to turn over Elian. The family's attorneys have said
 they would do so if ordered to by the INS, which has sought a transfer at a neutral
 site. But the relatives have publicly insisted Gonzalez would have to come to their
 house in Little Havana.

 If the negotiations break down and the relatives refuse to surrender Elian, legal
 experts say, the INS could seek a court order forcing the great uncle to release
 the boy. Continued defiance could then result in his arrest.

 Demonstrators who have been camping out around the clock in front of the
 relatives' Little Havana home Monday renewed vows to form a human chain
 around it to prevent Elian's removal, though they reiterated they would comply
 with the family's wishes. On Monday evening, protest leaders issued a call for
 people to come to the house, spend the night there and skip work today if
 necessary.

 At about 7:30 p.m., Lazaro Gonzalez approached the crowd of reporters outside
 his home and said, ''definitely, we will know tomorrow what decision we are going
 to make, the Gonzalez family and the government.''

 He said he hopes the impasse can be settled privately once Elian's father arrives.

 ''Never doubt that the Gonzalez family has their house open for their family,''
 Lazaro Gonzalez said.

 BARRICADES DOWN

 Three hours later, about half of the 200 protesters tore down the barricades and
 converged upon the front of Elian's Little Havana home, chanting: ''Liberty!'' and
 ''Justice!'' Moments later, the family made its late-night statement, calling for a
 family reunion in their home and a psychological evaluation of the boy.

 The government, however, is more focused on how it can transfer the boy to his
 father without incident.

 Its newest demands came as the Cuban government applied for U.S. visas for
 Gonzalez, his wife and child, and 25 others, including Elian's classmates and
 teachers and the president of Cuba's National Assembly, Ricardo Alarcon. Rubin,
 the State Department spokesman, said the other 22 visa requests are under
 review.

 ''The U.S. Interests Section in Havana will be submitting a list of questions to the
 Cuban government concerning these requests for visas to determine the merits of
 the individual cases,'' Rubin said.

 A source familiar with the negotiations said there was a possibility that Gonzalez
 could come directly to Miami to be reunited with his son. Under the Cuban
 government's original proposal, first floated last week in a speech by Cuban
 President Fidel Castro, Gonzalez and his entourage would settle in Washington
 with Elian while the Miami relatives' court appeal is concluded.

 CASTRO'S PRAISE

 In a televised speech Sunday night, Castro lavished praise on U.S. District Judge
 K. Michael Moore, who last month upheld U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno's
 authority to send Elian home, as well as on the Clinton administration and the
 American public, for supporting the boy's return to Cuba.

 ''Our people will be grateful for that,'' Castro said. ''American authorities, as well as
 outstanding and prestigious political figures, have expressed their hope that the
 father's presence can decisively contribute to solving the embarrassing issue.
 This encourages us to persevere in our efforts.''

 Castro said a plane ''is ready . . . provided the visas applied for were ready.'' It was
 unclear Monday whether the delay in approving the 22 other visa requests could
 hold up the father's trip.

 Castro defended his proposal to send Elian's teachers, doctors and classmates
 along with the boy's father, saying it was necessary, according to psychologists,
 to bring some normalcy to the boy's life while the appeal is heard.

 HEARING SET

 The appellate court in Atlanta has scheduled a hearing for May 11. If they lose
 there, the Miami relatives have said they would appeal to the U.S. Supreme
 Court.

 ''It is said that Juan Miguel will have to remain in the United States for at least two
 months, but that does not take into account the appeals, tricks and delays of all
 kinds to which Elian's unpunished kidnappers presumably will resort,'' Castro
 said.

 Meanwhile, the Cuban government erected a nine-foot bronze statue of patriot
 Jose Marti outside the seaside U.S. Interests Section in Havana. The statue
 holds a boy in his right arm and points his left index at the U.S. diplomatic
 mission.

 The government held a rally Monday, attended by a smiling Castro, Elian's father
 and about 3,000 university students, to inaugurate the statue and a massive
 concrete and steel stage evidently built for future protests.

 Luis Fernandez, spokesman for the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, said
 the members of the Cuban delegation would stay in the home in Bethesda, Md.,
 of the chief of mission, Fernando Remirez, and in the homes of other Cuban
 diplomats in the Washington area. Fernandez said a school for Elian and the
 visiting children would be established in Remirez's house.

 Castro said Sunday that he had asked Remirez to strip his home of diplomatic
 immunity because Elian's Miami relatives said ''they would never surrender the
 boy to a residence considered Cuban territory.''

 The three Cuban-American members of Congress said they fear that Gonzalez
 will be the virtual prisoner of Cuban security agents.

 They sent a letter to the father, through the U.S. Interests Section in Havana,
 promising him ''that all necessary steps shall be taken immediately'' to allow him
 to remain in the United States with his new wife and infant child.

 ''We truly hope that you, your wife and your infant son, somehow, shall find a way
 to evade the control of the multiple Cuban security agents who will be attempting
 to keep you and your family captive,'' wrote Miami Republicans Lincoln
 Diaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, and New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez.

 Of the pending visa requests, Alarcon's is the most problematic for U.S. officials.

 In the past, the State Department has approved requests for Alarcon, known as
 Castro's ''point man'' on the United States, to travel to New York to speak at the
 U.N., but rejected his bids to travel to other parts of the United States.

 Herald staff writers Marika Lynch and Eunice Ponce, Herald news services and
 Herald translator Renato Perez contributed to this report.

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald