Reflecting growing congressional dissatisfaction with the hard-line U.S. approach toward Cuba, the appeal from 20
Republicans and 20 Democrats came one day after former president Jimmy Carter delivered a speech in Havana urging closer
relations between Cuba and the United States, and the lifting of travel restrictions and the economic embargo.

The Bush administration quickly asserted that the embargo and travel restrictions must remain as long as Castro continues to
deny civil liberties to Cuba's 11 million citizens. President Bush intends to outline his policy Monday, emphasizing the idea of
being tough with the Cuban government and open toward Cuban citizens.

"President Carter speaks his mind, and he spoke his mind with respect to our policy, which he would like to see change but
which is not going to change," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told reporters on his way home from a NATO summit in
Iceland. "I think the president will reinforce that when he gives his speech. And I'm sure it will be a speech, though, that also
offers hope and promise to the Cuban people."

A debate over U.S. policy toward Cuba is brewing at a moment when Congress and the Bush administration are moving in
separate directions. Administration policy, developed with the help of conservative Cuban American appointees, aims to
enforce Castro's economic isolation and bolster pro-democracy forces, while congressional majorities have repeatedly voted to
go further by increasing U.S. trade and travel.

The Cuba Working Group is a new caucus created this year to push for changes in policies followed by Republican and
Democratic administrations. The range of districts and résumés of its members illustrates the evaporation of the ideological
cohesion that helped define U.S. policy during the Cold War, when Castro's communist government aligned itself with the
Soviet Union.

The group's nine-point plan issued yesterday is meant as a series of incremental steps. It does not call for direct U.S.
investment, diplomatic relations or foreign aid. The list included an appeal for normal exports of U.S. food and medicine; an end
to limits on money sent by Cuban Americans to relatives in Cuba; and the sunset next year of the Helms-Burton Act, which
tightened the U.S. embargo in 1996.

The group also recommended increased "security cooperation" between the two governments; an end to TV Marti, the
U.S.-sponsored television network that costs more than $20 million a year but is rarely seen in Cuba; and the creation of
scholarship programs to increase communication between Cubans and Americans.

In remarks to reporters yesterday, members of the working group asked why the administration enforces tougher trade rules
against Cuba than against Iraq or China. They noted that the United States on Tuesday sponsored a successful U.N. resolution
permitting virtually unrestricted trade in civilian goods with Iraq and that the administration pursues free trade with China despite
its one-party state and long record of human rights abuses.

The embargo opponents also noted that exposure to Western ideas through trade and travel influenced the pro-democracy
movements that swept aside the communist governments of Central Europe in 1989 and contributed to the collapse of the
Soviet empire. They pointed to arguments by successive occupants of the White House that economic openings in China and
Russia will lead to increased political freedoms.

"Adopt a policy of engagement. It has proven successful elsewhere in the world," said Rep. William D. Delahunt (D-Mass.),
who worked with Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) to assemble the group of representatives. The group's first goal is overturning the
travel ban.

"It's way past due. The reasons for putting it into place are far gone by already," said Marilyn Meiser, 75, a retired
schoolteacher who was fined $1,000 for taking a bicycle trip in rural Cuba. Reached in Milton, Wis., she said she had not
known she was breaking the law.

Carter's call for the lifting of U.S. sanctions and the public appeal by the lawmakers put the administration on the defensive.
Administration officials made clear, however, that the embargo policy will not change.

Bush also will remain firm on the travel policy, which led to 766 Americans being cited last year, up from 188 in 2000, officials
said. One condition the administration expects to enforce is the requirement that pilots of pleasure boats traveling to Cuba
obtain permission from the U.S. government.

"I wouldn't expect any dramatic departures from what the president and the secretary have said publicly about Cuba on
numerous occasions," a State Department official said.

The president intends to support measures designed to "expand the flow and the breadth of information available to the Cuban
people," the official said. That includes a revamping of the programming of Radio Marti, the Miami-based U.S. government
radio station that is the sister network to TV Marti, and an increased distribution of radios by U.S. diplomats in Havana.

"It's important for information to be made available about the possibilities and the alternatives that are out there," said the
official, who described the effort as "a continuation and a strengthening of the outreach program."

During the 2000 presidential campaign and his speech on Cuban Independence Day a year ago, Bush promised tougher
measures against Castro's government, including increased aid to dissidents inside Cuba, strengthened U.S. government
broadcasting to the island, and a tightened travel ban.

Proponents of such measures contend the administration has done too little in these areas over the past year. Hopes among
some Cuban Americans that the administration would change the amount and type of U.S.-government aid provided to
dissidents -- allowing direct cash payments in addition to office and information supplies -- have gone unfulfilled. TV Marti's
weak signal is jammed by Castro, and some supporters favor broadcasts from the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay,
Cuba.