By The Associated Press

          WASHINGTON (AP) -- Even as they push for more open trade with
          China, Republican congressional leaders are working to preserve the
          trade embargo on Cuba by blocking legislation that would allow Cuba to
          buy U.S. food and medicine.

          The measure, backed by the powerful American farm lobby, is attached
          to agricultural spending bills that have been approved by the House and
          Senate appropriations committees.

          But House GOP leaders, led by Majority Whip Tom DeLay of Texas,
          have delayed action this week on the House version of the spending bill
          while they try to strip it of the Cuba provision.

          ``Fidel Castro has built a dictatorship that allows no existence of private
          property and economic freedom. Consequently, trade with that kind of
          government will only serve to strengthen Fidel Castro,'' DeLay
          spokesman Jonathan Baron said Tuesday.

          ``By contrast, the People's Republic of China has seen fit to allow
          significant free-market activity and commerce among its citizens,'' he said.

          Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., has voiced similar
          concerns.

          In addition to allowing sales of food and medicine to Cuba, the legislation
          would prohibit the president from including food and medicine in future
          embargoes of other countries without congressional approval.

          The Senate overwhelmingly approved a similar trade measure last year,
          and supporters say they're confident it could pass the House as well. The
          House Appropriations Committee approved the measure 35-24 earlier
          this month over DeLay's objections. Some 220 House members signed a
          letter supporting an easing of the embargo.

          Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Florida Republican and Cuban American,
          believes he could stop the trade provision by raising a parliamentary
          objection on the House floor, a spokesman said. But supporters say they
          have enough votes to send the entire appropriations bill back to
          committee if Diaz-Balart does that.

          As an alternative, House GOP leaders have discussed removing the trade
          measure from the appropriations bill, stripping it of the Cuba language,
          and attaching the prohibition against future food and medicine embargoes
          to a popular crop-insurance bill nearing final action in Congress.

          ``We think we're going to prevail. The fight isn't over,'' said Steve
          Vermillion, a spokesman for Diaz-Balart.

          The issue is complicated by election-year politics. Some of the
          legislation's most ardent supporters, Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash.,
          and Sen. John Ashcroft, R-Mo., have tough re-election races. At the
          same time, the Cuban American community is a powerful force in
          Florida, a key state in this year's presidential campaign.

          Opponents of the Cuban embargo argue that it's hypocritical of
          Republican leaders to push for permanently normalized trade relations
          with China at the same time they are trying to preserve the Cuban
          embargo.

          ``American farmers are being asked to provide indispensable support for
          the China trade deal at the very moment that House leaders are trying to
          stab agriculture in the back, by preserving for a few more months the
          obsolete and ineffective food and medicine embargo against Cuba,'' said
          Steve Hilton, a spokesman for Ashcroft.

          Trade sanctions ``have not worked,'' said Audrae Erickson, a lobbyist
          for the American Farm Bureau Federation. ``These markets should be
          restored to us rather than handed to our foreign competitors.''

          The Clinton administration has not taken a stand on easing the embargo
          but has objected to the provision in the legislation that would give
          Congress a say in future embargoes.

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          The House bill is H.R. 4461; the Senate bill is S. 2536