Paraguay General Stages Rebellion Against Stroessner

This country’s second most powerful military officer, Gen. Andres Rodriguez, said early today that he has rebelled against the government of President Alfredo Stroessner to restore democracy to this landlocked South American nation.

A statement by Rodriguez was read on radio station March 1 hours after cannon and automatic weapons fire broke out in this capital Thursday night. The firing continued through the early hours of today.

Later, a spokesman for the opposition claimed that Stroessner had been placed under arrest by army rebels, the Associated Press reported. The news agency said there were no other details of the arrest.

In his statement, which the radio station repeated every five minutes, Rodriguez said:

“We have left our barracks in defense of the honor of the armed forces; for the full and total unification of the (ruling) Colorado Party in the government; for the initiation of democracy in Paraguay; for the respect of human rights; for the defense of our Roman, Christian, Apostolic, Catholic religion.”

Radio Caritas, a station owned by the Roman Catholic Church, also later broadcast Rodriguez’s statement.

He called on his comrades in arms to support his move, which he described as being for the benefit of the Paraguayan people.

Stroessner, who is also an army general and commander in chief of the country’s armed forces, has ruled Paraguay for 34 years.

Gunfire was first reported near the headquarters on Asuncion’s outskirts of the 1st Army Corps, where Rodriguez’s 1st Cavalry Division is based.

Tanks rumbled into the city, and heavy fighting broke out in the center of Asuncion, a city of 900,000, shortly before midnight Thursday as tanks hammered the central police station, setting it ablaze. The station, which occupies a full city block, is situated only a few hundred yards from Lopez Palace, the presidential office building.

Fighter aircraft flew over the city. Radio Caritas reported that tanks had surrounded Lopez Palace and that artillery fire was heard at the headquarters of the navy, six miles outside Asuncion.

Radio Caritas added that employees of the city’s two television stations, which had interrupted their transmissions before the firing began in the center of Asuncion, said that naval officers had occupied their buildings.

No information on casualties was available.

Diplomats said that the police and the Presidential Guard, a special armed forces detachment, had remained loyal to Stroessner.

Gunfire was also reported near the international airport and in various residential areas of the capital where government officials and top military officers have their homes. The home of Gen. Rodriguez was reported to be protected by a cordon of tanks from his cavalry division.

Aldo Zucolillo, owner of the newspaper ABC Color, which was shuttered by the Stroessner government four years ago, said by telephone that armored cars passed through his residential neighborhood early today and that he could hear the continuing sound of gunfire.

The fighting was the first since Stroessner, 76, took power in August, 1954, after a period of civil strife and anarchy during which Paraguay had seven presidents in seven years. Stroessner has ruled the nation dictatorially ever since, having been reelected president every five years in balloting that until recent times included not even a token opposition candidate.

Rodriguez, 64, is the father-in-law of one of Stroessner’s children. Diplomats and opposition political leaders said that Rodriguez recently has resisted orders from Stroessner to leave his active troop command and either retire or accept the post of defense minister in Stroessner’s Cabinet.

Last year Stroessner’s hitherto all-powerful Colorado Party, effectively the only political party allowed to operate, split when an orthodox faction known as the militants won the party leadership and expelled the so-called traditionalists.

Since then there has been open confrontation between the two groups.

Also, Stroessner reportedly has been in ill health since he underwent a prostate operation five months ago. His apparent slow recovery has fueled demands by opposition leaders that the army and the Colorado Party consider a transition to democratic rule.