The emergency powers -- granted by Congress Friday when it voted to
                  establish a "state of siege" -- also allow Gonzalez to suspend any citizen's
                  freedom of movement and ban public meetings and demonstrations.

                  Four congressmen have since been arrested.

                  In a nationally televised address Friday, Gonzalez announced the coup's defeat.
                  "This has been the last and definitive battle against perpetrators of political crime,
                  social instability and economic setbacks," he said.

                  Rebel troops, believed to be loyal to former army Gen. Lino Cesar Oviedo -- a
                  fugitive coup leader -- surrounded the Congress building in Asuncion late
                  Thursday, but were subdued about six hours later.

                  "The situation is totally under control," President Gonzalez said on television
                  before dawn. "We are going to be relentless in applying the law to all those who
                  have violated the law and the constitution."

                  Thursday's coup attempt was the third time in four years Paraguay's shaky
                  democracy has seemed on the brink of military rule. Oviedo, wanted in
                  connection with the assassination last year of Vice President Luis Maria Argana,
                  was near the center of each of the previous events.

                  Situation quickly went against rebels

                  The attempted coup began at about 7 p.m. (2300 GMT) Thursday when some
                  retired colonels and low-ranking active officers took control of the Paraguayan
                  army's largest armored unit. Aided by guards at the base on the outskirts of
                  Asuncion and a police unit, the rebels rolled a group of light tanks into the
                  capital.

                  The rebels fired on the legislative palace in the city center, blowing a hole in the
                  facade. The power was cut, plunging Asuncion into darkness, and residents
                  poured into the streets surrounding the building to show their support for
                  democracy.

                  The rebels surrendered before 3 a.m. (0700 GMT) after an Air Force threat to
                  attack and a brief gun battle with soldiers loyal to the president.

                  Col. Carlos Socrates Ramirez, who said he had been held hostage in the building
                  during the coup attempt, added that during the course of the takeover, it quickly
                  became "apparent that the situation was going against the rebels."

                  "The tanks are back in their proper place," he said.

                  But the rebels were not deterred. Retired Col. Vladimiro Woroniecki, a known
                  Oviedo supporter, promised there was more to come.

                  "This is just the beginning," he said as he was led away under arrest after the
                  revolt. "We have the constitutional right to rebel against tyranny."

                  Assassination plot alleged

                  Congressional President Juan Carlos Galaverna said when the revolt was over
                  that the rebels had planned to kill government officials, including Gonzalez
                  Macchi.

                  "Their list of targets to be physically eliminated, murdered, includes President
                   Gonzalez and the president of the Congress, who is now speaking to you,"
                   Galaverna said on CNN Espanol.

                  Galaverna said that Interior Minister Walter Bower and the ruling Colorado Party
                  vice-presidential candidate Felix Argana were also on the rebels' "hit list."

                  "Have no doubt that this is a new adventure of that psychopath Oviedo,"
                  Galaverna said.

                  A lawyer, at least one congressman, five retired officers and at least 24 active
                  soldiers were arrested after the coup. Chief of Police Casto Guillen was fired.
                  Some police officers were also reportedly detained.

                  After the assassination last year of Argana, Gonzalez, then chief of the
                  Paraguayan Senate, took over the presidency when then-President Raul Cubas,
                  an Oviedo protege, resigned and sought refuge in Argentina following a week of
                  violence in the wake of Argana's murder.

                  Oviedo's allies

                  Oviedo, too, had been granted political asylum in Argentina after Cubas'
                  resignation. But he left the relative safety of Paraguay's South American neighbor
                  in December, and has been reported to be hiding out in Paraguay.

                  Oviedo drew presidential ire in 1996 as well when he barricaded himself in his
                  office after being asked to step down as army chief by then-President Juan
                  Carlos Wasmosy.

                  Oviedo, Gonzalez and Cubas are all members of the Colorado Party, which has
                  run Paraguay since 1949. Much of that time -- from 1954 to 1989 -- the country
                  was controlled by the iron-fisted dictator Gen. Alfredo Stroessner. He was
                  overthrown by a palace coup.

                           The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.